Banksy painting shredder disabled

The shredder that partially destroyed a Banksy canvas moments after it was sold at auction last year has been “disabled”, a German museum said on Monday, ahead of the piece going on display.

Henning Schaper, director of Frieder Burda museum in Baden-Baden, said: “We wanted to avoid having a visitor who, just as in London hides a button ... and the shredding continues.”

The work, now called Love is in the Bin, will be shown on Tuesday for the first time since it was created in a theatrical stunt at London’s Sothebys in October.

“We opened the frame, we looked at everything and we saw that [the shredder] had been disabled,” said Schaper, without specifying who had done it.

Moments after the painting Girl with Balloon sold for more than £1 million – a joint record for the maverick artist – it literally went through a shredder hidden in the frame.

The buyer went through with the purchase and some art experts said it was probably now worth more before the stunt.

The work will be on display at the Frieder Burda museum until March 3. –