Luckily, Banksy has gained quite a lot of notoriety as an artist, so there's plenty of scholarly discussion on his work. From smaller, unrecognizable works to larger-scale, massive projects like Dismaland, Banksy has built a portfolio that few artists rival in terms of ambition and media coverage. Through the advent of social media usage and the expansion of user-generated content, Banksy amassed a huge social media following that tracked his every move, rushing to photograph every new Banksy piece that popped up on street corners and post it to their social media. This very unique, universally accessible format of art-sharing is often ruined when museum collectors re-sell their pieces, sometimes going so far as to remove the walls from buildings entirely to display them in an exhibition without Banksy's permission. He seems to allude to this in his piece, "Love is in the Bin," where he chooses to shred his own art rather than have it be sold at an auction to art collectors.

On 5Pointz, there exists the unique challenge of being able to analyze the buildings as a collection of murals rather than a single work of art. The murals gain meaning because they are part of a collective, and the buildings can be seen as a representation and homage to the collaborative nature of street art. However, it can be hard to find secondary sources on public art murals that aren't journalistic in nature. I think the most interesting part of the scholarly discussion around 5Pointz is whether certain forms of street art should have legal protections or be treated as graffiti just like any other scribbled tag on buildings. While researching the history of 5Pointz, its eventual demolition, and the ensuing legal battle, these queries came up time and time again. Viewing 5Pointz from this angle tends to produce more interesting scholarly debate. It goes back to the quilts of Gee's Bend, the question of who can be considered an artist and what, exactly, constitutes "legitimate" art.