Constable? Turner? No, UK’s favourite artwork is (apparently) a Banksy!
A MURAL by Banksy has beaten masterpieces by Turner and Constable in a poll to find the nation’s favourite works by British artists.
The graffiti artist’s 2002 creation called Balloon Girl, which he painted on the wall of a shop in Shoreditch, east London, has topped a list of the 20 best-loved British works of art.
It depicts a young girl letting go of a red heart-shaped balloon.
Second place went to John Constable’s 1821 landscape The Hay Wain, while third spot was taken by Jack Vettriano’s 1992 painting The Singing Butler.
JMW Turner’s 1839 work The Fighting Temeraire was fourth and Antony Gormley’s 1998 sculpture The Angel Of The North was fifth.
While the majority of submissions were paintings there were also a number of
Rose from obscurity
album covers, including Peter Blake’s design for the 1967 album by The Beatles, Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
The classic cover for Pink Floyd’s 1973 album The Dark Side Of The Moon also made the top ten.
The poll of 2,000 people was carried out to mark the launch of a new Samsung TV, The Frame, which carries more than 100 pre-loaded artworks for users to choose from, making it into a piece of art when not being used as a television.
Others who featured in the list of the 20 favourite works by British artists, according to The Frame National Art Audit, included Thomas Gainsborough, John Everett Millais, David Hockney and Henry Moore. Banksy rose from obscurity to become the world’s best-known graffiti artist. His work, which largely focuses on politics, sells for six-figure sums around the world and regularly makes headlines.
A mural showing a star being chiselled from the EU flag near Dover’s ferry terminal was confirmed to be a Banksy in May. In March the Daily Mail reported how £4million worth of the street artist’s work was accidentally destroyed.
Banksy had left a number of his stencils at the Geejam Hotel in Jamaica as a gift after a visit – but some were later mistaken for graffiti and were painted over. A hotel source said: ‘ Banksy left 11 stencils. However, builders thought a rogue visitor had defaced the walls, and promptly painted over the ones on the outside of the building.
‘When the mistake was realised, they were mortified.’