A slab of Brooklyn wall, which the artist Banksy emblazoned with a bandaged, heart-shaped balloon, is emerging after more than a decade in storage.
The preserved wall, dubbed Battle to Survive a Broken Heart, will be up for sale on May 21 at Guernsey’s, the New York auction house.
Some proceeds will be donated to the American Heart Association.
When the enigmatic street artist spray-painted the piece, the nondescript brick building was instantly transformed into an art destination and the canvas of an unlikely graffiti battle.
Almost as soon as Banksy revealed the piece back in 2013, an anonymous tagger brazenly walked up and spray-painted the words “Omar NYC” in red beside the balloon, to the dismay of onlookers.
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Days later, someone stencilled “is a little girl” in white and pink beside Omar’s tag, followed by a seemingly sarcastic phrase in black: “I remember MY first tag.”Some think it was Banksy himself who secretly returned to the scene to add the rejoinder.
The apparent graffiti battle did not end there.
Another tagger also attempted to leave his mark but was stymied by security guards.
Today, the phrase “SHAN” is still visible in light purple paint.
Maria Georgiadis, whose family owned the now-demolished warehouse and ultimately removed the section of wall to preserve the artwork, says the graffiti pastiche is quintessentially New York.
“It looks like a war going on,” she said recently. “They’re literally going at it on the wall.”
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Ms Georgiadis, a Brooklyn schoolteacher, says the sale is bittersweet.
Her father, Vassilios Georgiadis, ran his roofing and asbestos abatement company from the warehouse adorned with the balloon.
He died four years ago at age 67 from a heart attack, which is why some of the proceeds from the sale will be donated to the American Heart Association.
“It’s just very significant to us because he loved it and he was just so full of love,” Ms Georgiadis said on a recent visit to the art warehouse where the piece was stored for more than a decade.
“It’s like the bandage heart. We all have love, but we’ve all went through things and we just put a little Band-Aid over it and just keep on moving, right? That’s how I take it.”
The nearly four-ton, six-feet-tall wall section is one of a number of guerrilla works the famously secretive British artist made during a New York residency in 2013.
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At the time, Banksy heralded the work by posting on his website photos and an audio track recorded partly in a squeaky, helium-induced voice.
Guernsey auction house president Arlan Ettinger said it is impossible to know for certain because Banksy works clandestinely.
But he said the neat stencilling and wording “strongly suggest that this was a gentle way for Banksy to put the other artist in his place”.
Ulrich Blanche, an art history lecturer at Heidelberg University in Germany, called the piece a “very well executed” stencil, notable partly because of Banksy’s decision to place it in Brooklyn’s port area of Red Hook.
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“This part of NYC was not easy to reach at that time,” he said by email.
“Banksy wanted people to go to places in NYC they never have seen and love them as well.”
But Mr Blanche questioned whether the additional stencilled text was truly the work of Banksy, saying the word choice and design do not appear to comport with the artist’s style at the time.
Mr Blanche also said he is ambivalent about the pending sale, noting Banksy usually does not authorise his street pieces for sale.
At the same time, he understands the burden placed on property owners to protect and maintain them.
“Banksy’s works should be preserved, but for the community they were made for,” he said.
Spokespersons for Banksy did not respond to an email seeking comment.
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