LONDON: A painting by mysterious British artist Banksy shred itself into pieces at the moment it sold for more than one million pounds at an auction on Friday.

Onlookers gasped and laughed after the bottom half of “Girl with Balloon”, one of Banksy’s best-known works, was sucked into a shredder hidden in its frame as the hammer fell, auction house Sotheby’s said.

The 12-year-old painting had just been sold for 1,042,000 pounds. “It appears we just got Banksy-ed,” Alex Branczik, senior director and head of contemporary art, said in a statement on Sotheby’s website.

Banksy himself posted an Instagram picture of shocked attendees watching the painting disintegrate, with the caption: “Going, going, gone...”

The post, and reports of a man dressed in black sunglasses and a hat scuffling with security guards near the entrance to Sotheby’s shortly after the incident, led to speculation the artist was present to trigger it.

Sotheby’s did not disclose if it had prior knowledge of the stunt. Branczik said he was “not in on the ruse”, according to The Art Newspaper.

“We are busy figuring out what this means in an auction context,” he reportedly said. “The shredding is now part of the integral art work.”

Video footage showed two men taking the painting away shortly after the sale, bits of the image hanging down from the bottom of the frame in strips.

Sotheby’s did not release details on the buyer, but reports said the winning bid was made by telephone.

“We have talked with the successful purchaser who was surprised by the story,” the auctioneers said in a statement to The Financial Times. “We are in discussion about next steps.”

Banksy, whose real identity is unknown, is known for sharply ironic outdoor graffiti with political themes, including at Israel’s barrier at the West Bank and Disneyland where he painted a life-size figure of a Guantanamo Bay detainee.

Banksy rose to fame painting clandestine street murals, typically simple graffiti stencils with a sharp political point, all over the world.

The artist has also produced a treasure trove of other kinds of images, and his head-turning work have repeatedly sold for hundreds of thousands of pounds, including to a raft of famous people.

The price paid in London on Friday evening for “Girl with Balloon” matched the artist’s previous record at a 2008 auction for another work, Sotheby’s said.

Prior to its shredding, the faux-gilt framed piece — spray paint and acrylic on canvas mounted on board — depicted a girl reaching out towards a bright red, heart-shaped balloon.

It was instantly recognisable as a Banksy to anyone familiar with his work.

Mehdi Ben Cheikh, a Parisian street art specialist, said the stunt was “in the same vein as his performance in New York, which questioned the limits of the art market”. Banksy in 2013 set up a stand near the city’s Central Park and sold 20 signed canvases of his own work for $60 each.

Published in Dawn, October 7th, 2018