Banksy artwork highlighting domestic violence dismantled by local council

A new artwork by British street artist Banksy highlighting domestic violence against women was partially dismantled by the local council that claimed it was unsafe.

The piece — which features a 1950s-era housewife with a swollen eye and missing tooth apparently pushing a man into a chest freezer — appeared Sunday night on the side of a private home in Margate, a seaside town about 17 miles northeast of Canterbury.

The work, titled “Valentine’s Day massacre,” makes use of a real abandoned freezer that had been left on the adjoining property sometime before Banksy incorporated it into his mural.

The Thanet District Council claimed that the freezer was unsafe to keep on public land and wheeled it away Tuesday — just hours after Banksy posted an image of the mural on his Instagram, confirming it was his work.

“The fridge freezer is now in storage and will be returned once it has been made safe to the public,” the council said in a statement. “We will be contacting the owner of the property to discuss the options to preserve the artwork for the district.”

Without the freezer, the feet of the man who had been painted to look as if he were lying inside, now float freely on the whitespace of the brick wall.

Though the Valentine’s Day mural no longer has the full effect, locals were excited to see the piece by the famous, though anonymous, artist erected in their town.

Dozens of viewers flooded the spot to take pictures and admire the painting.

“I always thought maybe someone might put a mural on the wall, but I was never expecting a Banksy,” Margate resident Lee Hilton said.

Valentine’s Day Mascara is the second Banksy mural that incorporated a physical object that has been removed this year.

Last month, the East Suffolk council removed a dumpster — painted yellow and filled with rectangular planks made to look like french fries and situated next to a mural of an open-beaked, diving seagull — due to a consistent illegal dumping issue.

The mural, which was put up in August 2021, has also been recently covered up as renovations take place inside the privately-owned building, BBC reported.

With Post wires