Guerilla gum artist Ben Wilson sticks it to NHS bosses

Published: 16 April 2010
by JOSH LOEB & RAJDEEP SANDHU

AN artist who paints miniature street scenes on pieces of spat-out chewing gum has said he wants to create a piece of “protest art” outside the Whittington Hospital.

Ben Wilson, commonly known as “The Chewing Gum Man”, has been painting on pieces of dried gum on pavements around north London  for the past five years. His artwork can be seen close to Archway roundabout but this week the notoriously elusive artist told the Tribune he wanted to create a special piece of “guerilla art” in protest at plans to shut down A&E. He said: “What I do, I do voluntarily and I would not want it to be a money-making exercise. I want to do something outside Whittington Hospital, because they might be closing down the accident and emergency unit.”

The artist has been arrested twice and stopped and searched so many times he has lost count. He was recently asked to create a series of paintings for the Royal Society of Chemistry, who only managed to track him down after putting out an internet appeal offering £118 to anyone who could put him in touch with them.

The 46-year-old, who has painted on more than 10,000 pieces of chewing gum told the Tribune: “Painting on chewing gum isn’t breaking the law. 

“It’s a loophole. People usually find chewing gum disgusting but it’s about turning something that has been thrown away into something beautiful.”

Most the pictures Mr Wilson paints are requests from people he meets, tributes to lost loved-ones, love messages or even tags for gangs. 

His Islington pieces are part of a growing number by artists who have taken the borough as their canvas, including Banksy, King Robbo and an unknown artist who placed chairs in trees opposite the Archway roundabout several months ago, thereby creating an “instoolation”.