On October 5th, 2018, Banksy did it again. After the gavel landed declaring that his work, Girl with Balloon, would be sold at a Sotheby’s auction for 1.4 million US dollars, a shredder that artist had built into the frame began shredding the canvas at an almost infuriatingly deliberate pace. A little over half of the work was in strips, dangling from the bottom edge of the frame before it was removed from the room, leaving the attendants in muffled shock and the buyer looking rather constipated.
On October 6th Banksy posted a video 58 seconds long on his Instagram with the caption, “‘The urge to destroy is also a creative urge'” – Picasso.” The day before the video he posted an image titled “Going, going, gone…” of the bewlidered auction-goers staring at the shredded piece and yesterday, October 17, he posted an image of the intact work with a caption linking to “the Director’s cut” of the shredding with the affirmation that the painting did, in fact shred and that the auction house crowd was not part of the act. The partial shredding, however, was a malfunction.
The original buyer did continue with her purchase. The question is: why? I, along with countless others, would argue that the stunt, which couldn’t have been done by anyone else, increased the value of the work exponentially.
Avant-garde art functions off the premise that was is established must be challenged, and what is bold is truer art. Banksy, in this action, follows those guidelines. He challenges the wealth of the auction-goers, which is not out of character for an artist who gained popularity through his attention to the injustices of society, the hypocrisy of the infamous “those in charge” and the value of change, kindness, revolution, etc. Essentially, he plays with the Soetheby’s crowd and overturns the norm.
Furthermore, Banksy’s quote from Picasso reminds that art is of a fluid nature. It can be created, changed, or destroyed. And if we include action painting, performances, and more under our definition of art, why not destruction as well? Don’t we get just as much (if not more) fun out of destroying sandcastles as we do making them?
I will agree that this stunt could not have been pulled off by anyone else. Banksy has an established reputation as a rebel, a house-hold name that allows this story to gain such popularity, and a large social media following. Soetheby’s, too, is a well known event. He knew that this would be an event to get his name back in the papers. He knew it was a long time coming.
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