-----BREAKING NEWS-----

"Art shock" turned to horror last night as a live elephant featured in a downtown LA gallery show got out of control. The show was promoted as a "vandalized warehouse," featuring graffiti and other works by infamous UK "art terrorist" Banksy.

It took trainers and guards over an hour to sedate the elephant with many MDMA-filled darts. (MDMA potency is proportional to body-weight.)

12 visitors were reportedly hurt, and many of Banksy's finest pieces of anti-capitalist satire ruined.

LAPD forces have secured the Hunter Street/Santa Fe area and are questioning witnesses; "there is no basis for allegations that this elephant went crazy as a protest against Banksy's bad taste in using security guards to protect his own art from vandalism. Elephants don't do critical theory. Sorry."

Banksy's LA show had already spiralled out of control Friday afternoon, when animal rights activists discovered a real live elephant in the Hunter Street warehouse. The story hit the front page of the LA Times Saturday morning, and many tousle-haired hipsters found the show deluged by Soccer moms and kids, to their great dismay.

Samantha, denizen of a warehouse next-door, said she'd asked Tai, the 198-year old elephant, how he felt about being bodypainted: "He looked melancholy, but said the stencil and colors weren't bad. He only went along with it because Banksy told him he was going to get to go to Burning Man. Personally, that's why I think he got so pissed off. It wasn't a critique of the art or Banksy's pretensions at all. He just wanted to be the first Pachyderm to set foot on the Playa since Lake Lahonton evaporated. And nap under the Belgian Waffle."

Two of the the twelve injured Silverlake 20-something hipsters are in serious condition, but still hope to make the Shepard Fairey opening tonight. Fairey's agent, Mary Karnowsky commented, "We can neither confirm nor deny that we have rented an elephant for our reception."

Thousands more stood around the police cordons, waiting for a glimpse of the elusive UK artist. Jesca Hoop strummed the guitar, while Toby Marks sampled her for his next album. A crew of zapatista punks from the South Central Farm sold postcards with counterfeit Banksy signatures and tried to plant aloe vera under the freeway, while Alex Jones ranted on his bullhorn about the New World Order and the Danger of No-Planers. Nico Haupt leafletted the crowd with his satirical list of 9/11 'truthling plane-huggers', and someone else played old Mark Stewart tracks on a boombox while giving away donuts.

"Hey, this circus is better than the show itself," commented Leo Zhao, a local designer and IDM DJ. "I mean, I don't know if I accept Alex's interpretation that the 'elephant in the living room' stands for media complicity with the 9/11 neocon perps. That's a little monophonic, and naively essentialist. I think we need to be more rhizomatic in our deconstructions of the official narrative."

The show has been shut down to the public and only close friends of Brad, Angelina and Jude are being allowed to see the trampled ruins of the controversial exhibit, according to the security guards. Asked about their conspicuous bullet proof vests, one guard noted: "I think it's some kind of a joke. That guy Banksy's a fuckin' wanker. But he paid us good."

Rumors of a MonkeyGoBoom break-in party late Sunday night are completely unfounded, according to the LAPD: "We have the block totally secured, if any aging ravers think they're going to get in here and throw an illegal mutant dubstep party, they're in trouble."

The artist Banksy was unavailable for comment; but a late Friday press release stated Banksy will be trading roles with legendary comic artist Brendan McCarthy. Banksy will give up street art for a new DC comics series called Take it to the Bank; and McCarthy will take up the spraypaint can and commit himself to cement, steel and glass vandalism forevermore.

Tai's trainers report the elephant is recovering his composure: "it was a bad night, that's all."

Paris Hilton was nowhere to be seen.