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Banksy's ‘Sunflower from Petrol Station’ to Fetch 13 Million Pound at Auction

A Banksy painting inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers which is to be auctioned in November 2021. The painting, titled Sunflowers From Petrol Station, is being sold by fashion designer Sir Paul Smith.
A Banksy painting inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers which is to be auctioned in November 2021. The painting, titled Sunflowers From Petrol Station, is being sold by fashion designer Sir Paul Smith.
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Banksy's ‘Sunflower from Petrol Station’ to Fetch 13 Million Pound at Auction

A Banksy painting inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers which is to be auctioned in November 2021. The painting, titled Sunflowers From Petrol Station, is being sold by fashion designer Sir Paul Smith.
A Banksy painting inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers which is to be auctioned in November 2021. The painting, titled Sunflowers From Petrol Station, is being sold by fashion designer Sir Paul Smith.

Banksy's "Sunflowers From Petrol Station" is being sold by fashion designer Sir Paul Smith and it has been valued at between £8.8 million and £13.2 million. The work is inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers.

According to the daily Mirror, the 2005 artwork will be displayed in Los Angeles and Hong Kong ahead of its sale in New York next month. Sir Paul said: "What initially attracted me to Banksy was his confidence and clarity to communicate something exactly as it is. I was so impressed by his observations of what was happening in the world and that remains true of the work he's doing today."

"His political statements are completely on point, really profound, really brave and consistently delivered in a modern way. I was delighted to have the opportunity to be able to own a piece of his work and the Sunflower itself presents such a brilliantly unique way of thinking about things," he continued.

Commenting on the piece's display for auction, Katharine Arnold, Christie's head of post-war and contemporary art in Europe, said: "Following the record-breaking sale of Game Changer in March, another major oil on canvas by Banksy - we are delighted to offer Sunflowers From Petrol Station this November."

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Scientists Rebuild Face of 400-year-old Polish 'Vampire'

A three-dimensional reconstruction of Zosia's face, a woman buried as a vampire, is pictured, in this undated handout photo taken in Stockholm, Sweden. Oscar Nilsson - Project Pien/Handout via REUTERS
A three-dimensional reconstruction of Zosia's face, a woman buried as a vampire, is pictured, in this undated handout photo taken in Stockholm, Sweden. Oscar Nilsson - Project Pien/Handout via REUTERS
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Scientists Rebuild Face of 400-year-old Polish 'Vampire'

A three-dimensional reconstruction of Zosia's face, a woman buried as a vampire, is pictured, in this undated handout photo taken in Stockholm, Sweden. Oscar Nilsson - Project Pien/Handout via REUTERS
A three-dimensional reconstruction of Zosia's face, a woman buried as a vampire, is pictured, in this undated handout photo taken in Stockholm, Sweden. Oscar Nilsson - Project Pien/Handout via REUTERS

Buried with a padlock on her foot and an iron sickle across her neck, "Zosia" was never supposed to be able to come back from the dead.
Entombed in an unmarked cemetery in Pien, northern Poland, the young woman was one of dozens feared by her neighbors to have been a "vampire".
Now, using DNA, 3D printing and modelling clay, a team of scientists has reconstructed Zosia's 400-year-old face, revealing the human story buried by supernatural beliefs, Reuters reported.
"It's really ironic, in a way," said Swedish archaeologist Oscar Nilsson. "These people burying her, they did everything they could in order to prevent her from coming back from the dead... we have done everything we can in order to bring her back to life."
Zosia, as she was named by locals, was found in 2022 by a team of archaeologists from Torun's Nicolaus Copernicus University.
Aged 18-20 when she died, analysis of Zosia's skull suggests she suffered from a health condition which would have caused fainting and severe headaches, as well as possible mental health issues, Nilsson said.
The sickle, the padlock and certain types of wood found at the grave site were all believed at the time to hold magical properties protecting against vampires, according to the Nicolaus Copernicus team.
Zosia's was Grave No. 75 at the unmarked cemetery in Pien, outside the northern city of Bydgoszcz. Among the other bodies found at the site was a "vampire" child, buried face down and similarly padlocked at the foot.
Little is known of Zosia's life, but Nilsson and the Pien team say items she was buried with point to her being from a wealthy — possibly noble — family.
The 17th century Europe she lived in was ravaged by war, something Nilsson suggests created a climate of fear in which belief in supernatural monsters was commonplace.
Nilsson's recreation began with creating a 3D printed replica of the skull, before gradually building layers of plasticine clay "muscle by muscle" to form a life-like face.
He uses bone structure combined with information on gender, age, ethnicity and approximate weight to estimate the depth of facial features.
"It's emotional to watch a face coming back from the dead, especially when you know the story about this young girl," Nilsson says.
Nilsson said he wanted to bring Zosia back "as a human, and not as this monster that she is buried as".