Stolen Art DealerBanksy’s half-shredded painting in an ornate gilt frame: a red heart-shaped balloon on a white wall remains inside the frame, while the stencilled girl hangs below it in vertical strips of canvas.
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Catalogue No. 02 · Sotheby’s · London
Love is in the Bin
Sold for
$25.4million
Sotheby’s, London · 14 October 2021 · 85th of 392 in the Record Book
Confirmed by two sourcesAbout $30.9 million in today’s money: 350 years of the typical US household’s income. Source
- Artist
- Banksy (British, Active since the 1990s)
- Title
- Love is in the Bin
- Date
- 2018
- Medium
- Spray paint and acrylic on canvas mounted on board, in the artist’s frame, with a decommissioned remote-controlled shredder
- Size
- 142 × 78 × 18 cm (55⅞ × 30¾ × 7 in)
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The narration from our Reel, about a minute long.
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The hammer fell. Then the painting shredded itself. This was Banksy's Girl with Balloon, the last lot of the night at Sotheby's London. October twenty eighteen. It had just sold for over a million pounds, then an alarm went off in the frame. The canvas slid down, and came out of the bottom in strips. The girl was cut to ribbons. The balloon survived. Sotheby's said it best: it appears we just got Banksied. Banksy says he built the shredder in years earlier, in case it ever hit auction. His own video suggests it was meant to destroy the whole thing. The buyer paid anyway, and Banksy's team renamed it: Love is in the Bin. Three years later it came back to the same saleroom. Nine bidders. About ten minutes. Sold, for twenty-five point four million dollars. About eighteen times its first price. It's still Banksy's auction record, and the shredder is still inside the frame. Some art is worth more in pieces. Follow Stolen Art Dealer. The story behind the price, every day.
October 2018, Sotheby’s London. Banksy’s “Girl with Balloon” was the last lot of the night, and it sold for £1,042,000. Then an alarm went off inside the frame and the canvas slid through a hidden shredder, coming out in strips below.
The clue was hanging in plain sight. Sotheby’s catalogue called the unusually deep gilt frame “an integral element of the artwork chosen by Banksy himself”. Banksy later released a video of a shredder being fitted into it, and says he built it years earlier in case the work was ever put up for auction. The video suggests the whole canvas was meant to go. That is Banksy’s version, and nobody has confirmed it.
The buyer, a European collector, went ahead anyway, reportedly saying she would end up with her own piece of art history. Banksy’s authentication body, Pest Control, certified the half-shredded canvas as a new work, “Love is in the Bin”. Sotheby’s called it the first artwork created live during an auction.
Almost three years to the day, on 14 October 2021, it came back to the same saleroom. The estimate was £4–6 million. Nine bidders pushed it to £18,582,000 with premium, or $25.4 million: three times the high estimate, about 18 times the 2018 price, and a new auction record for Banksy.
The sale
- Auction house
- Sotheby’s, London
- Date
- 14 October 2021
- Lot
- 7
- Estimate
- £4–6 million
- Sold for
- $25.4 million (including buyer’s premium) · £18,582,000
- Record
- Auction record for Banksy (as of October 2026)
Test your eye on the market: set your estimates
Provenance
2006
Painted as “Girl with Balloon” and passed from the artist to a private collector, reportedly as a gift. Reported
5 October 2018
Offered at Sotheby’s London as lot 67, the last lot of the evening, and hammered at £860,000 (£1,042,000 with premium). The shredder then activated.
October 2018
The buyer, a female European collector and long-standing Sotheby’s client, completed the purchase at the same price. Pest Control certified the half-shredded canvas as a new work, “Love is in the Bin”.
2019–2020
Shown at Museum Frieder Burda, Baden-Baden, in February and March 2019, then lent long-term to the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart from March 2019 to February 2020.
14 October 2021
Consigned by the same owner and sold at Sotheby’s London, lot 7, for £18,582,000 with premium. Sotheby’s described the buyer only as an Asian collector.
See it on a wall
Sources
- Sotheby’s: Love is in the Bin, Contemporary Art Evening Auction, London, 14 October 2021, lot 7
- Sotheby’s: Banksy Brings Down the House at the Contemporary Art Evening Auction
- Sotheby’s: Latest Banksy Artwork “Love is in the Bin” Created Live at Auction (October 2018)
- The Art Newspaper: Sotheby’s “Banksy-ed” as painting self-destructs live at auction (5 October 2018)
- AP via NBC Los Angeles: Shredded Banksy Artwork Sells for $25.4 Million at Auction (14 October 2021)
- Guinness World Records: Most expensive Banksy artwork sold at auction
Prices include the buyer’s premium, in US dollars at the time of sale, unless marked as a hammer price.