The most expensive Banksy ever sold

Banksy is always in the spotlight. This time not for a new mural, but for his 2009 painting which has just been sold by Sotheby's in London for £9 million, about €11.1 million. The work, priced at around £2m before the auction, depicts MPs in the Westminster House of Commons as chimpanzees and is entitled Devolved Parliament, "an allusion to an evolutionary regression in the shape of monkeys". At the beginning of the year, the painting, almost four and a half meters wide and two and a half meters high, had been exhibited at the Bristol Museum on the occasion of Britain's exit from the EU on 29 March. The same artist had then explained on Instagram:

“I made this 10 years ago. Bristol museum have just put it back on display to mark Brexit day. Laugh now, but one day no one will be in charge.”

After the record sale Banksy returned to IG commenting:

“Record price for a Banksy painting set at auction tonight,” he wrote. “Shame I didn’t still own it.”

Luckily for the buyer, this time the mysterious writer has only written a post and didn't destroy the work as he did last year with Girl with Balloon.