The Greatest Auction is facing some backlash from Channel 4 after producers were alerted that a possible Banksy sold for £250,000 might be a fake.
A piece tentatively attributed to the mysterious artist was auctioned on the primetime show last month, but art collector Jeff Salmon raised some potential problems.
The piece featured a stencilled rat – which is a well known Banksy character – with the words ‘I never liked this Banksy’, mirroring his ‘I never liked The Beatles’ artwork.
Salmon was told he wasn’t needed at filming for the auction scenes, having offered to stand up during the sale and declare the piece as a forgery, pointing to testimony from a firm involved in its restoration.
Production company Curve Media has denied any connection between the 70-year-old collector’s absence from the auction scenes and his comments to chief executive Camilla Lewis.
A spokesperson for Channel 4 said: ‘The production team spoke to a number of experts and could not get a definitive answer as to whether this was or was not a work by Banksy so the inclusion of the work in the programme was framed around the fact that these pieces are selling for huge sums of money despite this uncertainty.
‘The programme invited a number of potential buyers, many of whom were experienced art dealers, to view and possibly bid on the lot. As was shown on the programme, there was not a consensus.’
Meanwhile, the team had issues with the idea of Salmon planning to stand up and to stop the auction and claim the work wasn’t authentic.
They added: ‘Although the auction house is constructed for the series, the auctions are not produced. Each is led by an experienced auctioneer and how they appear in the series accurately reflects what happened.’
The spokesperson also said: ‘The Greatest Auction connects sellers with intriguing items and collectors and dealers who are willing to pay their own money for the right object. The decision to buy or sell is entirely up to them.’
In the show itself, two dealers questioned the work being attributed to Banksy, with the show’s narration mentioning the difficulties around confirming its authenticity of the piece, which was removed from a carpark in 2016.
After the show aired Liverpool street artist Silent Bill immediately claimed he was the real creator, and it was credited to him in a self-published book in 2017.
However, it was labelled as a ‘Banksy on the Greatest Auction’, and winning bidder Robert Barton admitted he was reassured by a lack of claims of authorship from anyone else.
And it’s emerged that the buyer had no idea Salmon had spoken to Lewis before the sale, after finding the art on the website of Sincura, which took the piece from the car park and handled its restoration, claiming it wasn’t genuine.
Despite this, Barton has told The Guardian that while he had no clue about the claims, he didn’t feel deceived, adding: ‘I believe there is enough doubt thrown on it that it is makes me nervous but I stand by the fact that until someone proves it is not Banksy it remains Banksy.’
Source My Celebrity Life.
