Girl with balloon

A little girl in black reaches toward a red heart-shaped balloon that seems to be slipping away from her, painted on a weathered gray wall. Banksy, the mysterious British street artist whose identity remains a secret, first sprayed this scene near London's South Bank around 2002. The image relies on his trademark stencil style, all crisp black shapes with just one burst of color for the heart. Off to the side, the phrase "There is always hope" adds a gentle ache to the whole thing, leaving you unsure whether the balloon is drifting off for good or about to be caught after all.

Simple as it looks, this piece has become one of Britain's most cherished artworks, topping polls of the nation's favorites again and again. Its strangest chapter came in 2018, when a framed copy sold at auction for more than a million pounds. Seconds after the gavel dropped, a shredder hidden inside the frame whirred to life and sliced half the canvas into ribbons in front of the shocked crowd. Banksy renamed the half-shredded result "Love is in the Bin," and instead of destroying its worth, the prank only made it more valuable and more talked about. That kind of cheeky jab at the art world sums up Banksy perfectly.