It’s no stretch to assume that world famous and apparently “unmasked” British street artist Banksy is no fan of Brexit.
In May 2017, Banksy painted a massive mural in the port town of Dover – Britain’s main gateway to continental Europe – showing a workman on a ladder using a hammer and chisel to chip away one of the twelve gold stars on the European Union flag.
Now, one of the artist’s other anti-Brexit installations is soon heading to auction in London.
Titled “Keep Ou T” and currently displayed ahead of Phillips’ Frieze Week Modern & Contemporary Art Auctions in London, the artwork dates from 2019 and is expected to fetch up to €2.1 million.
The words “KEEP OUT” are painted onto the repurposed shuttered gate of an EU arrivals gate from Heathrow airport. Except the ‘T’ is missing. One of Banksy’s signature rats can be seen using the ‘T’ as a tool to crack the padlock at the bottom of the closed border gate.
Banksy’s “Keep Ou T” seems to express the artist’s disdain towards Britain’s decision to leave the EU and the piece shares a similar sentiment to that of his 2018 artwork titled “Vote To Love”, which had a heart-shaped balloon over a UKIP ‘Vote Leave’ placard.
At the time, “Vote To Love” was priced at £350 million – a taunt aimed at Boris Johnson’s infamous Leave Campaign bus which pledged to save the same amount for the NHS post-Brexit. A decal on the side of the bus made the false claim / pledge: “We send the EU £350 million a week, let’s fund our NHS instead”. The bus became one of the most prominent symbols of the Leave Campaign and the £350m figure was widely disputed, including by both the UK Statistics Authority and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
“Keep Ou T” is estimated to sell for £1.2 million – £1.8 million (€1.4m – €2.1m). The auction takes place 15 October in London.