A Banksy artwork stolen from a London gallery has been retrieved and will be returned after an investigation by the Metropolitan Police's Flying Squad.
Two men have been charged with burglary after Girl with Balloon was taken on Sunday, the Metropolitan Police said.
Larry Fraser, 47, and James Love, 53, were charged with non-residential burglary and remanded in police custody.
The artwork was taken from the Grove Gallery in New Cavendish Street, west London, at around 11pm on Sunday.
Girl with Balloon was the only item stolen and has now been recovered and will be returned to the gallery, police said.
Banksy animal artworks appear in London – in pictures
Fraser, of Beckton, east London, and Love, of North Stifford, Essex, appeared at Wimbledon Magistrates’ Court on Thursday where they were bailed to appear at Kingston Crown Court on October 9.
Earlier this year, a man was given a two-year suspended prison sentence by a court in France for using a lorry to steal a Banksy stencil from the back of a parking sign in Paris. Mejdi R, 38, a musician, admitted in court that he used an angle grinder in September 2019 to remove part of the sign on which the secretive British artist had depicted a masked rat holding a box cutter.
He claimed he was a friend of Banksy, who had asked him to retrieve the artwork on the sign near the Centre Pompidou arts complex in Paris.
Banksy artworks removed
Girl with Balloon is a series of artworks, with the piece at the west London gallery one of several versions. Another version hit the headlines in 2018 when it partially self-destructed at an auction where it had been sold for £1.1 million ($1.4 million).
The canvas passed through a shredder hidden inside the large frame, leaving the bottom half in tatters and only a solitary red balloon on a white background left untouched. The partially shredded piece, entitled Love Is In The Bin, was sold for £18,582,000 in London by auction house Sotheby’s in October 2021.
This summer, several pieces in Banksy’s animal-themed series were moved for safekeeping, with one defaced hours after it went up. The silhouette of a howling wolf on a satellite dish in Peckham, south-east London, was taken less than an hour after it was confirmed to be authentic. Another piece in his collection, a silhouette of a rhino, was defaced by a man wearing a black balaclava shortly after it went up.
Banksy's piece at London Zoo, which shows a gorilla lifting a shutter and allowing birds and a seal to escape, was removed and replaced with a replica in August. Another artwork, which shows piranhas in a police sentry box on Ludgate Hill, meanwhile, was moved temporarily to Guildhall Yard to keep it safe, the City of London Corporation said.
ONCE UPON A TIME IN GAZA
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Directors: Tarzan and Arab Nasser
Rating: 4.5/5
The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on
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Read part one: how cars came to the UAE
A State of Passion
Directors: Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi
Stars: Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah
Rating: 4/5
Analysis
Maros Sefcovic is juggling multiple international trade agreement files, but his message was clear when he spoke to The National on Wednesday.
The EU-UAE bilateral trade deal will be finalised soon, he said. It is in everyone’s interests to do so. Both sides want to move quickly and are in alignment. He said the UAE is a very important partner for the EU. It’s full speed ahead - and with some lofty ambitions - on the road to a free trade agreement.
We also talked about US-EU tariffs. He answered that both sides need to talk more and more often, but he is prepared to defend Europe's position and said diplomacy should be a guiding principle through the current moment.
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Distance covered: 160km
Temperature: -40°C
Weight of equipment: 45kg
Altitude (metres above sea level): 0
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South Pole stats
Distance covered: 130km
Temperature: -50°C
Weight of equipment: 50kg
Altitude (metres above sea level): 3,300
Terrain: Flat ice
MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW
Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Rating: 3.5/5
The years Ramadan fell in May
Dubai World Cup Carnival card:
6.30pm: Handicap (Turf) | US$175,000 | 2,410 metres
7.05pm: UAE 1000 Guineas Trial Conditions (Dirt) | $100,000 | 1,400m
7.40pm: Handicap (T) | $145,000 | 1,000m
8.15pm: Dubawi Stakes Group 3 (D) | $200,000 | 1,200m
8.50pm: Singspiel Stakes Group 3 (T) | $200,000 | 1,800m
9.25pm: Handicap (T) | $175,000 | 1,400m
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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THE SPECS
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Closing the loophole on sugary drinks
As The National reported last year, non-fizzy sugared drinks were not covered when the original tax was introduced in 2017. Sports drinks sold in supermarkets were found to contain, on average, 20 grams of sugar per 500ml bottle.
The non-fizzy drink AriZona Iced Tea contains 65 grams of sugar – about 16 teaspoons – per 680ml can. The average can costs about Dh6, which would rise to Dh9.
Drinks such as Starbucks Bottled Mocha Frappuccino contain 31g of sugar in 270ml, while Nescafe Mocha in a can contains 15.6g of sugar in a 240ml can.
Flavoured water, long-life fruit juice concentrates, pre-packaged sweetened coffee drinks fall under the ‘sweetened drink’ category
Not taxed:
Freshly squeezed fruit juices, ground coffee beans, tea leaves and pre-prepared flavoured milkshakes do not come under the ‘sweetened drink’ band.
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US Industrial Market figures, Q1 2017
Vacancy Rate 5.4%
Markets With Positive Absorption 85.7 per cent
New Supply 55 million sq ft
New Supply to Inventory 0.4 per cent
Under Construction 198.2 million sq ft
(Source: Colliers)
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What is a Ponzi scheme?
A fraudulent investment operation where the scammer provides fake reports and generates returns for old investors through money paid by new investors, rather than through ligitimate business activities.
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