A few hundred years ago, in 2009, two major events happened:


The world fell into it's 5th deep winter, which contradicted proven research regarding global warming at the time. The entire US was covered in snow, and the average temperature drop was 20-25 degrees Fahrenheit. The other, more major event, was the murder of the influential graffiti artist, Vincent Striphe, more commonly known as Banksy. His death led to the cultural and artistic shift that is responsible for the visual landscape we live in today. The art/design/graffiti/advertising revolution came together around the events that led to Banksy's death. The 10 months prior to his death tell an incredible and rousing story.

In January 2009, the highly influential graphic designer, Peter Saville appeared at a D&AD lecture to show new works and field questions from the audience. One of the audience members asked Saville to comment on Banksy's work. His response was close to an entire dismissal of Banksy's work. Saville hinted that his work is irrelevant and the hype surrounding him is undeserved, and only came from an excess of money in the London Art society. The entire exchange had been caught on camera, though the tapes were never released, and soon Saville's comments were spreading through the design & fine art world like wild fire. The remarks were talked about in publications everywhere, and became a white-hot topic.

On April 1st, a new Banksy piece was spotted down the street from the public school Saville attended as a child in Manchester, UK. The life size stencil resembled Saville wearing a dunce cap, and holding a rat by the tail. The image was set up to resemble an album cover, a major part of Saville's work. This instantly became huge headline news everywhere, however many doubted its legitimacy and actual meaning - it was spotted on April Fools day after all. Despite this, the Internet propelled the feud to epic proportions, comparable to those seen during the 2pac vs. Biggie events. Within the week, Saville responded publicly at the Gremlar Design Conference in Ohio. His reaction was to scoff at Banksy's idea of mockery and general lack of meaning and importance in the piece. Banksy continued plastering smaller versions of the piece around the UK and the USA. Many of the smaller versions had slight alterations; one particularly interesting one had Saville wearing a leopard print thong doused in liquid that looked like Pepto Bismol. He was also able to get into the retrospective on Saville at the MOMA in San Francisco and replaced 3 of Saville's famous album covers with slightly altered versions. The originals were never recovered. As Banksy continued his silent attack, Saville was constantly defending his position.

Finally in late summer, Saville called Banksy out in an article for Eye magazine. In it, he challenged Banksy to a one on one conversation and Q&A session at the upcoming Music Art Design (MAD) Conference in Miami. Banksy accepted and also announced that he would finally be revealing his true identity. The event was going to be the headline of this new festival and soon bets were being set up in design studios and advertising offices around the world.

In October, when the time finally arrived, with the deep winter worsening; Miami was covered in snow. The festival coordinators decided to host a Q&A over dinner on the famous Cinatit cruise ship in the Miami harbor. Both men took the stage after the dinner, which was apparently a delicious king crab, and the discourse began. Banksy began by revealing his name and history to the audience, then the two men began to discuss their viewpoints and validations on issues regarding art, fine art, design, graffiti and advertising. As their conversation became more and more heated, Banksy began to fume and it became apparent that he was a very erratic and short-tempered man. This was a shock to many because any recorded interaction with him until that moment, pointed to him being a very calm and cool individual. The heated discussion escalated into a physical fight.

The two proved to be great fighters – thanks to years in UK bars and soccer games - and soon the boat was trashed.

Eventually Banksy and Saville found themselves on the bow, each with a sword they had found on statues inside the ship. Every person at the conference made their way to the boat watching the two duel it out like real men. Finally after a rousing 5-minute sword battle, the two men managed to hurl themselves onto a nearby glacier. The two fell through a thin top layer and soon found themselves inside a hollowed out cave in the glacier.

Not much is known after this point, but what became certain a couple hours later was that Banksy was dead, and Saville was nowhere to be found. The only conclusion any of the detectives could come up with was that Saville stabbed Banksy repeatedly and slit his throat. They also discovered that Banksy had gotten in a good hit or two as Saville’s teeth and blood were splattered about the cave. About 3 months later, Saville’s manager issued a statement regarding the events and Saville's disappearance. It read like something out of a fiction story: Saville claimed that the two fought and he had indeed killed Banksy, then he slipped out onto another glacier and found his way back to dry land about 10 miles from the harbor. He made his way back to New York and stayed with friends in the underground community that had been formed in the months leading up to the severe winter. He spent the next couple months learning the ways of the underground inhabitants, or morlocks, as they liked to be called. He spent time forgetting his past life and focused on rebuilding civilization underground.

After tracking down friends Saville had contacted before disappearing, his manager found Saville living in a sewer, delusional and attempting to direct ants, much like the foreman of a big construction project. Under court order he was thrown into a mental asylum deep in Louisiana territory. There are no further mentions of his name after that point, no death certificate, and his hospital records abruptly halt in June 2012. However, many in the art and design world, believe that Saville cracked the design code and created a black hole of design, which he jumped into never to be seen or heard from again.