If you infringe Banksy’s copyright and he sues maybe you’d get to find out his real name in court?
The fact he’s a (imagery) thief and wind-up merchant, among other things, makes me suspect you could get away with it.
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So what is the scam? Is there not a lot of people that want to own something made by Banksy? Isn’t that enough to make it valuable?
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Worth every penny.
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I think it’s more interesting now. Especially the way it only half shredded so you can clearly see it caught in the act.
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Let’s see… exploited artists… manipulated market… no oversight at all… The scam isn’t about Banksy, it’s about how artists never enjoy the profits that others make off their work. If anything, Banksy is trying to highlight that through this prank.
Mind you, I also think book dealers and real estate agents are also scammers, so…
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this was obviously a stunt on multiple levels, it would be mildly amusing if it wasn’t so staged.
as it is, i say a solid “meh”. next time they should hire a professional magician to help make it more believable.
as others have said…
the auction house would have done a very very thorough inspection of the piece, no way they could not have known.
the frame was very suspicious, like a bad magic prop.
the piece stayed exactly half intact, it only shredded halfway, and it alerted everyone it was shredding, and did it in a highly visible way that left the piece very displayable in an altered and arguably more interesting way, instead of actually destroying it. this makes a very different statement.
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I had to use that one on my mom recently at an art museum. Art hate is so lazy.
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Good one! The link made it
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Ok, I see where you are coming from. I think things are a lot better now than they used to be, but there’s certainly room for improvement.
I don’t think anybody is really exploiting the Banksy group though. They seem to know exactly what they are doing. I’m pretty sure Sotheby’s were in on it as well.
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It’s an insurance scam. The broker never owned a “Banksy”.
How can you prove someone didn’t get a work directly from a provider that no one knows?
Great long term planning.
I don’t think this is an insurance scam because the artwork has doubled in value.
Also Robin Gunningham was there and was stopped by security on the way out. What are the chances of that. Also the Banksy Instagram page has video of the entire thing, including the creation of the frame mechanism:
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Love art, hate the art world. Really love art that goes against the grain of the art market – although to be fair, it will absorb anything. An artist genius, touched by god, can shit in a can and the art world will absorb it. I think the market is the main problem.
In many countries, art is treated as national culture and artists are paid a nominal fee to create work. (I know, socialism, eh?) It’s not a lot. The market is driven more by historical significance, so you get museums spending $8m on historically significant pieces that are 50 years old. But in countries like the UK and US, the market dominates everything, so naturally, a star system develops: some artists get rich and famous, 99% starve – like the rest of the economy, and hedge funds invest millions in relatively new art, like it was a stock, or a luxury condo. It’s a speculative market that feeds off the cult of personality, like the entertainment industry. But unlike entertainers, no artist is ever as good as a dead artist. The art market: death and gambling on fetish objects 
This is why we get work like Damien Hirst’s diamond encrusted skull. We get art that reflects the art world back at itself. It’s a great critique in THAT context, but it might be better to have a completely different system. (I don’t ascribe to the idea that you have to treat the proles like shit to get good art out of them. Yet another exploitative myth.)
I like Banksy and I think this piece is excellent
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You need to locate your sense of humor.
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I just hope they rename the piece “Suck it, Hirst.”
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Could you perhaps rig something with springs? Or compressed air? Go for the steampunk aesthetic? Is this the dawn of a new art form? Questions indeed.
Right …then he can paint something with the ashes and separate more fools from money .
