Bury St Edmunds Rugby Club help move Banksy artwork from Moyse’s Hall Museum
A group of rugby players banded together to help move a Banksy artwork worth millions of pounds out of a museum in Bury St Edmunds today.
Players from Bury St Edmunds Rugby Club volunteered to help wheel out Banksy’s Sand Castle Child from Moyse’s Hall Museum and load it onto a lorry as the Urban Frame – Mutiny in Colour exhibition came to end on Sunday.
The six-strong team had to manoeuvre the piece of wall out of the doors of the museum – where it got slightly stuck – before it was craned onto the back of the truck.
Craig Germeney, chairman of Bury Rugby Club, said: “We get a few requests from the community to help in projects where we feel we can make a difference.
“This was the most nerve-racking request. We helped move a memorial flower thing earlier in the year, but definitely this is the most expensive thing we’ve moved.”
Art dealer John Brandler, who owns several Banksy works and lent a couple of pieces to museum’s in Suffolk, said: “The museum staff were told they weren’t allowed to physically help me because it’s big and heavy and they could have hurt themselves when they moved it in.
“So panic.
“I needed people I could trust so I rang Bury Rugby Club.”
The Sand Castle Child work is soon to be on its way to Monza in Italy, but the truck will first make a stop in Newmarket to pick up Hula Hoop Girl from the National Horse Racing Museum where an exhibition was also held.
Mr Brandler wanted to loan the artwork to the museum in Bury because of his love of the town.
“Me and my partner Linda love Bury St Edmunds. It’s an amazing town. It’s got a real community spirit. Artwork is there to be seen,” he added.
He hopes other museums in the UK will take him up on the offer to display Banksy works.