‘BNE Was Here’ Stickers Investigated May 3, 2009
Posted by Martin in : Miscellaneous , trackbackFor at least 6 months I’ve been noticing these strange ‘BNE WAS HERE’ stickers around our apartment in Yannawa.
Also around the area I’ve seen spray-painted graffiti with the same wording or ‘King BNE’.
I also noticed exactly the same stickers around Japan in Osaka and Tokyo and it finally piqued my curiosity enough to Google it. It seems that this graffiti began in San Francisco in 2006 and has certainly hit Bangkok and Tokyo and apparently New York too.
Although nothing’s been proven, the most popular belief online is that it’s the work of a prolific graffiti artist called Benet, who is wanted by San Fransisco council with a $25,000 reward on his head. Benert apparently travels a lot although I can’t imagine him enjoying his holidays much if he’s spending his time sticking his signature to everything he passes. The cost alone of printing must exceed most modest people’s travel budgets.
There is also the 1-image website BNE One that is registered to a Japanese person who’s being fingered as the culprit.
The internet is full of discussions about this BNE phenomenon and I even found somebody selling the unused stickers on EBay from a guy purporting to be a friend of a friend of a friend. His stickers come with a warning that the glue is so strong that it’s nearly impossible to remove.
Some seriously doubt that BNE is acting alone. It must have taken considerable effort to make his mark in just our area of Bangkok, and there are reports that’s it’s infected many more areas too. To be able to make a similar impact overseas too suggests perhaps a loosely organized group.
I’m curious to know what will happen when they find the perpetrator. He’s supposedly costing San Fransisco about $1.2m every month in cleanup work and could be potentially prosecuted in every place he’s ever left his mark.
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I found on that site a range of images, http://www.bneone.com/top_images/
Yah, me too, I am kinda confused about this BNE thing, the reason why, I tried to search it here….now i know, thanks a lot
I’ve spent the past few months traveling around the world, and was amazed at how often I saw these – Bangkok, Tokyo, Melbourne, Hong Kong — I think Auckland and Shanghai too. They are definitely ALL OVER New York too. Even in rather non-touristy places. It’s definitely strange.
We see them in Brisbane and Melbourne. Also saw them in Thailand but not in Cambodia. I just assumed it was viral marketing to promote travel to Brisbane.
It’s now hit Melbourne, Australia.
BNE Come To New Zealand!!! C’mon NZ Would Love A Global Graff Artist Tag Or Sticker Our Buildings…