British street artist Banksy sponsors a boat used to rescue refugees from Europe from North Africa, The Guardian reported on Thursday.
The boat, which sailed from the Spanish port of Burriana on August 18, put 89 people in distress in the Mediterranean on Wednesday, according to the Guardian. The ship is named Louise Michel, after the French feminist and anarchist who played an important role in the Paris Commune in the late 19th century.th ieu.
The ship is apparently currently looking for a safe seaport to disembark or transfer passengers to a European Coast Guard ship.
It has Banksy artwork on the side depicting a girl in a life jacket, and sails under a German flag. It is manned by European activists who have previously been involved in other rescue missions involving more than 100 people, according to the newspaper.
The artist would email Pia Klemp, the former captain of several other lifeboats, last September.
“Hello Pia, I read about your story in the newspapers. You sound like a badass, ‘he wrote. “I’m an artist from the UK and I’ve done some work on the migrant crisis, of course I can not keep the money. Can you use it to buy a new boat or something? Please let me know. Well done. Banksy. ”
Kemp said she initially thought the message was a joke, but later accepted Banksy’s help, understanding that his involvement would be limited to financial support.
“Banksy will not pretend he knows better than we do how to run a ship, and we will not appear as artists,” she said.
The Louise Michel is smaller but considerably faster than most ships used for the same purpose. Klemp said it would be equipped to “hopefully escape the so-called Libyan coastguard before joining boats carrying refugees and migrants and retreating to the detention camps in Libya.”
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