went up for auction at Sotheby's London.

Moments after the auctioneer banged his gavel

announcing its sale for over $1.3 million,

a beep sounded and the canvas began

to fall through the bottom of the frame

and emerge in shreds on the other side

just after Banksy posted a picture of it

with the caption going, going, gone

and then followed up with a video showing

how he installed a shredder in the frame in case

it ever went up for auction.

Sotheby's claimed they had no idea

that this was going to happen and had been Banksyed.

And the buyer was anonymous, which is common in auctions.

After a week when media conjecture had

run dry over who knew about it and would the buyer have

to pay for it, Sotheby's put out a press

release explaining that what actually happened

was that a new work by Banksy had been created

at the auction, one that's been authenticated by the artist

and given the new title "Love is in the Bin".

After that, Banksy released a director's cut explaining that

in rehearsals, the paintings shredded fully every time,

including some vertical video to firmly place the rehearsals

in the recent past, proving both that he's a master manipulator

and that his word cannot be trusted.

OK, but let's take a closer look at what this work actually is.

Banksy first painted the image of a child reaching out

toward a red, heart-shaped balloon in London in 2002,

this one with the inscription "There is always hope."

Other versions were made around the city,

but none of the original murals remain

because this, like most of Banksy's work,

was unsanctioned street art made without permission

for the public to enjoy and for property owners or city

government to paint over or protect as they see fit.

Individuals can and have tried to remove and resell

his public art, but for the most part

Banksy's work has been fleeting and free

and is actively planned to be that way by its creator.

The heart balloon appeared alone in 2013

with bandages in Brooklyn and also with kids standing

on a pile of guns at a Central Park art stall on sale for $60.

In 2014, he reworked the girl with balloon image in supported

the With Syria campaign, explaining,

"The red balloon carries the girl above and away

from the chaos below, beyond the burnt-out buildings

and bullet-potted walls."

Also in 2014, Justin Bieber had the image tattooed on his arm.

A version with a Union Jack balloon

surfaced in 2017 in a print Banksy

tried to give away to UK citizens in some constituencies

if they voted against the Conservative Party.

But since it's illegal to accept a gift in return for a vote,

the offer was rescinded.

And a few days later he posted this.

In a 2017 poll, "Girl with Balloon"

beat out both this painting by JMW Turner and this one

by David Hockney to claim the title

of the UK's favorite artwork.

This is all to say that by the time the work in question

arrived at auction it was a well-loved and widely

recognizable image, estimated to sell for as much

as about $400,000 US.

The auction report shares that it's not

a multiple but a unique work made

in 2006 with Banksy's signature method of stenciled spray

paint but this time on canvas instead of on a wall

or as a print on paper.

It was authenticated by Pest Control, the handling

service that acts on the artist's behalf

and authenticates his work.

Sotheby's claims it was acquired directly from the artist

by the unnamed present owner the year

it was made following a show he organized of his work

in an LA warehouse, and it came in that gilded frame--

ah, the frame-- which Sotheby's states was,

quote, "chosen by Banksy himself."

Gold frames are one of the artist's favorite motifs.

In conjunction with that same LA warehouse show,

he released a print that clearly expresses

his dubiousness of the auction process

and even presented it in a ridiculous gold frame.

And for his 2009 exhibition at the Bristol museum,

Banksy mixed his works in with the museum's collection, many

of them in period appropriate frames, helping his art

blend in, at least sort of.

One of these was a gold frame laid over a concrete slab

with one stick figure asking, "Does anyone really take

this kind of art seriously?", and another replying,

"Never underestimate the power of a big gold frame."

A year later, this image appeared on a wall

in San Francisco clearly demonstrating

the uneasy situation Banksy has found himself

in as his profile has risen and more and more people try

to benefit of unauthorized sales and exhibitions of his work.

Now I find it unlikely that no one at Sotheby's knew

what was going to happen with this big gold frame

or that anyone inspecting it would find

nothing suspicious about it.

I also find it unconvincing that Banksy's video

showing his frame construction was made back in 2006

or that it's coincidental that it was

the last lot in the auction.

Banksy very well could have been the prior owner.

Sotheby's doesn't have to disclose that information.

Regardless, what happened indicates

very strongly that people really do take this kind of art

seriously.

They probably would have even if it

hadn't been in the gold frame, but they're certainly

taking it even more seriously now that the frame has

revealed itself to be an integral part of the work.

When he posted his video, Banksy included the quote by Picasso,

"The urge to destroy is also a creative urge."

And Banksy certainly isn't the first artist

to incorporate destruction in art making.

Man Ray made his first indestructible object

in 1923, an altered metronome that the viewer

is instructed to smash when they've reached,

quote, "the limit of endurance."

Robert Rauschenberg is famous for his 1953 erased Willem de

Kooning drawing, and Nicki de Saint Phalle for her 1961

exhibition in which she asks visitors

to fire at her relief paintings with a .22 caliber rifle.

There are many ways a work of art comes into being, be it

an additive process, a subtractive process,

one that must unfold in space and time,

or one that's immaterial, not existing

until the moment it's performed and then disappearing

as soon as it's over.

"Girl with Balloon" was one artwork,

and now it's another that came into being

through a public action but which still very much has

a material presence because the object wasn't destroyed.

It's only half shredded.

And since it was canvas going through,

the remaining fringe is pretty stable.

I can totally see an art packer carefully

crafting a crate that will keep it safe

and sound until its next exhibition.

It really only got more interesting when shredded.

Editioned prints, or paintings of Banksy's images,

even if sanctioned by the artist, are all right,

but they certainly don't have the subversive power

or presence of his art made in and for the public arena.

His gilt frames had served the purpose

of emphasizing the artificiality of putting these images meant

for the public into private hands,

but now one of those frames has revealed

itself to be an agent of insurrection,

however incomplete its act of destruction.

And the art world loves being questioned and criticized.

It's weird.

It's almost like a kind of high-class nagging

which they've even given their own academic-sounding term.

Institutional critique is what they call the art that actively

critiques the structures it lives in

and that make it possible, like museums or galleries

or, in this case, an auction house.

It became a thing after institutions

started to collect more ephemeral and performative

works made by artists in the '60s and '70s

by artists strategically trying to avoid

the traditional spaces for art.

But no matter.

Museums were happy to matriculate

these invasive works and include them in their histories of art,

and in many cases people proved willing to buy them too.

And so it's not at all surprising

when something as straightforwardly material

as this work by Banksy can fetch such a high price at auction,

and it's not surprising either when

its collector is willing to accept it's transformed

and likely even more valuable state,

especially now that post action it

embodies some aspect of the subversion that

makes Banksy Banksy.

It can actually live more comfortably in an exhibition

now than it could before, hanging half

in and out of its frame, telling its own history of Banksy's

shenanigans.

But there's also another important element of this work

that we might be overlooking, and that's the publicity

and press that has swirled around it,

which I'd argue is as much a part of the work as what went

down at Sotheby's.

Banksy is brilliant at attracting attention

and generating controversy.

His anonymity is part of that and something I hope never

goes away.

With this work, he draws attention

to the auction process in general,

which is followed closely only by an extremely tiny community.

Most of us see headlines about multimillion dollar sales,

feel nauseous, and then move on.

The auction system in its current form

survives in part because most people aren't paying attention

to it.

It's a highly efficient way for the international uber-rich

to buy and trade valuable assets.

Sure, some are in the game for good reasons,

but Banksy's action has made us all more

aware of a few key facts.

People are willing to pay ungodly sums of money for art

these days.

With rare exceptions, none of that money goes to the artists.

These are secondary sales, meaning

one owner is selling to another.

Most artists are completely powerless when

their work goes to auction.

To take back some of that power, you might have to get

your hands a little dirty, like when Damien Hirst orchestrated

his own direct-to-auction sale in 2008 and like this recent

stunt by Banksy, which may or may not have been executed with

the cooperation of Sotheby's.

Whether or not we assume what Banksy says is true--

which we really shouldn't--

"Love is in the Bin" still reminds us

of the convoluted power structures

that vie for what art and which artists

get anointed as important and valuable.

We like Banksy's work because it helps us see the gross power

imbalances all around us, even if they're

imperfect and temporary and corruptible by outside forces,

or perhaps we love them more because of those things.

Banksy may seem like less of the pure countercultural rebel he

once was, but I, for one, appreciate

these recent attempts at effecting change, however

small, from the inside, or at least with one foot in and one

foot out, able to capture money from sales

that will happen with or without his blessing,

and perhaps apply those proceeds to new work in the future.

I, for one, will be looking out for some very public

$1.3 million expenditures from Banksy

in the not-too-distant future.

I'll leave it to him to surprise me.

Do you want to know more about money so you can maybe

buy a Banksy one day?

"Two Cents" is a PBS Digital Studios

series about money and you.

Financial experts and husband and wife team Philip Olson