Shredded Banksy artwork sells for $25.4 million
Would you pay $25.4 million for a painting that's half-shredded? If it's a Banksy original, you certainly would.
That was the case for “Love is in the Bin,” a Banksy artwork that was originally known as “Girl With Balloon” before it shredded itself after it sold at an auction in 2018 for $1.4 million. A shredder hidden in the frame turned on as soon as the winning bid was made in the 2018 auction by an anonymous European buyer.
While Sotheby's was criticized in 2018 for not discovering the shredder in the frame, the auction house's chairman of modern and contemporary art, Alex Branczik, described the shredding as “one of the most ingenious moments of performance art this century.”
“It has been a whirlwind to follow the journey of this now legendary piece and to have it back in our midst, offering it tonight in the very room it was created by the artist,” Branczik said. “Banksy is no stranger to making headlines and this latest chapter in his story has captured imaginations across the world -- we can only begin to guess what might come next.”
Banksy also posted on his Instagram account to say that the auction house was not aware that “Girl With Balloon” would be shredded as soon as it was auctioned off.
Before the auction, the half-shredded “Love is in the Bin” was valued by Sotheby's auction house between $5.5 million to $8.2 million. However, a 10-minute bidding war quickly drove up the price of the artwork, with an undisclosed buyer paying $25,383,941, an amount that includes an auction house fee known as a buyer's premium.
Before this record amount, the highest price a Banksy artwork has fetched for at an auction was $23.1 million for “Game Changer," an artwork that the artist had initially donated to the University Hospital Southampton (UHS) in May last year. The proceeds from that auction were donated to the UHS and other health organizations and charities.
While his artwork fetches astronomical amounts in auctions, Banksy's identity is still unknown up to this day. His work is often found in public places like bridges, buildings, and street walls.
The country's own celebrity artists like Solenn Heussaff also took the quarantine as a time to create their own works of art. Check them out in the gallery below.
