Banksy painting for UK health service sells for record £16.75m

LONDON: A painting by the British street artist Banksy sold for a record £16.75 million ($23.1 million, 19.4 million euros) on Tuesday, with proceeds going to benefit state health service staff. The painting, “Game Changer”, sold to an unnamed buyer for £14.4 million plus costs — the highest ever for a Banksy painting — after fierce bidding at Christie’s auction house in London.

The signed oil painting by the elusive artist shows a boy holding aloft a nurse doll while Batman and Superman figures are consigned to a bin.

It first appeared at Southampton General Hospital on England’s south coast, during the first wave of the global coronavirus crisis in May last year.

The artist — who first emerged out of Bristol’s graffiti scene in southwest England in the 1990s — left a note with the painting thanking hospital staff for their work battling the pandemic.

“Thanks for all you’re doing. I hope this brightens up the place a bit, even if it’s only in black and white,” he wrote.

Proceeds from the auction will go to NHS charities and a reproduction of the piece will continue to hang at the Southampton hospital.

The auctioneer hailed Banksy’s “incredible gesture” in donating the work.

“It is a Game Changer in every sense,” he said of the painting.