Game Changer

Delivered anonymously to University Hospital Southampton in May 2020 during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, Game Changer is a monochrome painting depicting a young boy kneeling in dungarees, playing with a doll of a nurse. The nurse figure wears a traditional uniform with a face mask and a cape billowing behind her in a classic superhero pose. A small red cross on her apron provides the only splash of color in the black-and-white composition. In a wastebasket beside the boy, action figures of Batman and Spider-Man lie discarded, replaced by a new kind of hero.

Banksy accompanied the work with a handwritten note to hospital staff: "Thanks for all you're doing. I hope this brightens the place up a bit, even if it's only black and white." On 23 March 2021, exactly one year after the UK's first COVID lockdown, the painting sold at Christie's London for £16.8 million, making it the most expensive Banksy work at auction at the time. All proceeds were donated to NHS-affiliated charities.