A Banksy print worth about $34,000 was stolen from an unauthorized exhibit of the graffiti artist’s work in Toronto, Canada, the Guardianreports. Police have since launched an investigation and released security footage of the print being stolen. The video shows a man breaking into the exhibition at 5:04 a.m. on Sunday.
“We were called about a break and enter in the city’s west end,” said Constable Jenifferjit Sidhu on Thursday. “At some point last Sunday a Banksy print was removed from the exhibit.”
The print that was stolen was known as the Trolley Hunters print, and depicts a traditional image of three hunter gatherers: three men in loin cloths, armed with spears and axes in a grassy field. In true Banksy style, they’re hunting for grocery shopping carts instead of food.
This is the Banksy piece stolen from Toronto’s “The Art of Banksy” exhibition; a man entered through an interior door at 5:04 am Sunday and walked away with “Trolley Hunters”: pic.twitter.com/hbt46UcQWM
The exhibition, titled the Art of Banksy, was curated by Banksy’s former manager, Steve Lazarides, but has allegedly not been endorsed by the artist himself. It opened this week in Toronto in an industrial building. The exhibition describes itself as “the largest Bansky exhibit ever assembled” and boasts over 80 original works by the famous street artist. The pieces include screen prints, sculptures, canvases, and multimedia.
Toronto hasn’t always done Banksy this dirty. Back in 2017, a piece titled Guard with Balloon Dog was in danger of being destroyed before a group of art lovers purchased the chunk of concrete and restored it.
