Painted over

Former BBC New York correspondent Nick Bryant tells his Substack readers of a day in March 2018 when he filmed Banksy just after a furtive painting exercise at The Houston Bowery Wall.  He'd tipped off his bureau chief and the editor of the 10 O'Clock News that he might have a scoop (Nick's piece has a picture of a hand with paint on the fingers). Banksy's artistic target was not Trump, but a mural in support of jailed Kurdish artist Zehra Dogan. It reads as if Banksy drove off fast before Nick could get a word. 

As Nick wrestled internally with the rights and wrongs of identifying a fellow Bristolian on air, a call came through from London.  "A senior colleague told me that his daughter had accompanied him to work that day, and thought it was wrong to unveil Banksy. We should not be the news organisation, she reckoned, to tell kids there was no Father Christmas. It was an understandable point of view, I said, but perhaps we should get a second opinion. The BBC’s then arts editor entered the fray, explaining that whenever he asked audiences if they wanted to find out Banksy’s true identity, they all cried out no. In a culture fixated by fame, namelessness evidently held an even higher currency. The BBC’s then head of news agreed. So we buried the footage."

A little coy, Nick. Name the burial party.  The BBC Arts Editor was Will Gompertz.  Director of News and Current Affairs was Fran Unsworth.  The Editor of the 10 O'Clock News was Paul Royall.  Paul Danahar was News bureau chief in Washington.