King of the Edgelords and somehow still anonymous street artist Banksy is up to his old high jinks yet again. This time, he’s gone and bamboozled art collectors at an action, where one of his artworks sold for $1.7 million and then immediately self-destructed via a remotely-activated shredder hidden in the picture’s frame.
A copy of the artist’s 2006 artwork ‘Girl With Balloon‘ was the last item auctioned at Sotheby‘s auction house in London yesterday. Just after the hammer fell on the £1.04 million piece of art, the picture began to self-destruct, with about half of the canvas passing through the shredder and ending up dangling pathetically from the frame.
Frankly… rude.
But whatever – let’s instead have a moment of appreciation for the elite members of the art world, please, for playing the role of monocle-popping scandalised rich people with Oscar-worthy aplomb. I mean that header image is straight out of r/Accidental Renaissance. What a treat.
How did all of the experts at Sotheby’s who evaluated the piece fail to notice the piece contained a shredding mechanism?
— Duncan Stott 🏗️🏘️ (@DuncanStott) October 6, 2018
Sotheby’s senior director Alex Branczik even helpfully provided this immortal quote to local media:
It appears we just got Banksy-ed.
Indeed you did, my friend. Indeed you did.
BANKSY CANVAS SHREDDED at SOTHEBY’S AUCTION IN LONDON https://t.co/PmdugKdWwJ pic.twitter.com/oVQHm8xeOl
— Michael Surtees (@MichaelSurtees) October 6, 2018
Let us not ignore the fact that the stealth-shredder conveniently did not reduce the entire canvas to a worthless pile of trash, but left the purchaser with a highly aesthetic and completely re-saleable artwork that’s probably going to be worth a hell of a lot more that it sold for now. Don’t want anyone feeling too sorry for the anonymous buyer now.
$1.3M Banksy Artwork “Self-Destructs” at Auction. “You could argue that the work is now more valuable,” Branczik said. “It’s certainly the first piece to be spontaneously shredded as an auction ends.” https://t.co/ve5SesTb6C
— Rob Goldman (@robjective) October 6, 2018
Branczik confirmed that this is the first artwork to be spontaneously shredded upon sale at auction. Some are speculating that the artist himself was in the room in order to activate the shredder; I suppose we can only dream.
