A building in Los Angeles with a Banksy work of a girl on a swing appearing to hang from a pre-existing “Parking” sign is going on sale this October, the New York Times reported Thursday.
Tarina Tarantino and Alfonso Campos purchased the building in 2007 for $4 million to become the headquarters for their business, the Tarina Tarantino accessories brand. Banksy made the work on an alley-side wall of the building in 2010.
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When the pandemic hit, the brand was hit hard, and the owners have since filed for bankruptcy protection, and are set to auction off the building with Hilco Real Estate as part of the filing.
“This is an extremely difficult property to value. You can’t look at it from just a straight real estate appraisal value. You can’t look at it from a straight art value. It’s a combination of both,” Jeff Azuse, senior vice president of Hilco Real Estate, told the Times. “An auction, when you let the market determine the value, is very beneficial when it’s difficult to put a value on a property or an asset.”
Though it’s difficult to assess the value that the Banksy brings to the building, Tarantino and Campos estimate that they may get as much as $30 million for the seven-story building.
Despite Banksy’s intention that his graffiti be free public art, that hasn’t stopped two different English landlords from removing entire walls of buildings that Banksy had made his work on in the hopes of selling them for big money. Though the Times mentions that big auction houses like Sotheby’s have been offered these carved-out murals and refused to sell them, the two English landlords managed to sell the works for six-figure sums in private sales.
Source: artnews.com