A Banksy painting sold at auction for $1.4 million - then automatically shredded itself

auction n.拍卖

Anonymous British graffiti artist Banksy has pulled off another stunt that seized the attention of the art world - this time at the expense of his own work.

anonymous adj.匿名的           graffiti n.墙上的涂鸦
pull off 成功完成，做成某事   stunt n,噱头

On Friday, a Banksy painting titled "Girl with Red Balloon" was being auctioned at Sotheby's in London. The bidding climbed to an extraordinary $1.4 million, an amount that tied the artist's own auction record from 2008. Finally, a hammer pounded to signify the end of the auction.

bidding n.出价，喊价       tie v.得分相同，平局
pound v.反复击打，连续猛击     signify v.表示，说明

Right then, the painting's canvas began moving downward, seeming to pass through its elaborate gilded frame - and reappearing below in neat, vertical strips. Later, Sotheby's would explain that a shredder was hidden inside the frame.

canvas n.画布       elaborate adj.精心制作的
gilded adj.镀金的   reappear v.重新出现    strip n.纸条，带

"It appears we just got Banksy-ed, " Sotheby's senior director Alex Branczik said in a statement that described the incident as "the first time in auction history that a work of art automatically shredded itself after coming under the hammer." He told the outlet, "We are busy figuring out what this means in an auction context. The shredding is now part of the integral art work."

shredder n.碎纸机，切碎机       incident n.事件，事故
integral adj.构成整体所必须的

Banksy later posted a video to Instagram that showed footage of a shredding mechanism being built into the frame. "A few years ago I secretly built a shredder into a painting, " he stated in the video text, "in case it was ever put up for auction…" The video then jumped to clips of Friday's auction at Sotheby's, indicating that Banksy - or someone who works with him - was there when it happened.

footage n.电影片段，镜头       mechanism n.机械装置
put up for auction 把...交付拍卖      clip n.片段

"The urge to destroy is also a creative urge, " Banksy captioned the Instagram post.

urge n.冲动       caption v.给(图片、视频等)加说明文字