Street Art theft!!

Street art enthusiasts connected to Kunstveggen, along with the local council, got the idea of trying to preserve street art originally made illegal by Dolk and Pøbel around In Bergen city. The council gave 50 000 krones (about 8500 dollars) for the purpose. The result is that officials glued plexiglas on ten street art works.

The idea and protection plan is controversial among street art interests.  A local street art blog, Mot Veggen, argued against the this type of protection for two main reasons. The first reason is that street art is ment to be temporary and second, the protection of certain "valuable" street art works would draw unwanted attention to the works. It seems like the like the blog was right. Few days after the protection plan became public through local media, a work by Dolk, "Grenade Lovers" was stolen from the streets of bergen.

The stolen piece"Grenade Lovers" by Dolk

Now there is just a wooden plate where the Dolk piece where done about 8 years ago outside a pub in Bergen and a part of street art culture is gone. Part of Dolk's talent was/is to pick locations for his works and now the place looks sad and empty.

There is a price of 30 000 krones (about 5100 dollars) to those who can find the work, but local media speculates that the piece may be worth about 200 000 krones (about 34000 dollars). It's no coincidence between the protection plan and the theft. Theft? Well, the owner of the building is unsure. He have not really thought of this work as his belonging. It was made without his permission and is unsure if he can report this to the Police as stolen property. I don't know what the law text says about this, but he got a point. The city have never claimed ownership of the piece either. So, no one really owns this. The thieves have stolen something that don't belong to anyone, but something that belongs to everyone, me included. And I think that the thieves should give it back.

Steel plate placed where the Pøbel work used to be

It's not the first time someone removes street art works from the streets of Bergen. A piece by Pøbel was removed early spring. There are thieves of street art and the sad part is that there probably are buyers.

The stolen Pøbel piece

Summer 2012 Banksy made the work below in North London, later it was stolen, cut out of the wall. The community started to demonstrate, claiming the work back on their street. Later the piece was exhibited in Wynwood, Miami Basel in US for sale on an auction. The street art piece had been stolen by the owners of the wall (the building) in London. The reactions among people in London and US where strong, and the work was withdrawn from the auction. Later, on a private auction in London in June 2013, the work was sold for more than a million pounds. Read a BBC report here.

Image of the Banksy original VIA www.liveauctioneers.com "Slave labor"

In february 2013 I took this photo in London where the original "Slave Labour" work by Banksy where placed

Street art can be an easy target for theft because the works are made in public places for everyone. Unless the artist makes huge works on thick concrete walls! At least, that will make theft really hard.