A BANKSY mural created on a wall in Nottingham has been bought by a gallery dealer in Essex for a "six figure sum".

John Brandler, owner of Brandler Galleries in Brentwood, Essex, spent “a six-figure sum” to buy the mural, which appeared on the corner of Rothesay Avenue in Lenton in October before being removed early on Wednesday morning.

Mr Brandler said he saved it from a “death sentence”, despite protests from locals.

The 65-year-old said the artwork, which shows a girl hula hooping with a bike tyre, had started to form mould within its protective plastic casing, and he plans to restore it and move it to a museum in Suffolk.

“If I hadn’t bought it and removed it, in two years’ time there wouldn’t have been a Banksy there at all,” he told the PA news agency.

“I appreciate the council were trying to protect it from vandals coming along but actually it was creating a death sentence for it.

“I am pleased I’ve been able to save it from destruction.”

Picture taken with permission from the twitter feed of @dangolstein of the removal of the Nottingham Banksy mural. John Brandler, the owner of Brandler Galleries in Brentwood, Essex, spent a six-figure sum to buy the mural, which appeared on the corne
  • The mural being removed. Picture: Twitter/@dangolstein/PA

Mr Brandler said he is paying thousands of pounds to send the artwork to Scotland where it will be restored.

The artwork will then be put on display in a museum in Bury St Edmunds, but Mr Brandler said the entire exhibition could return to Nottingham in the future.

“This isn’t a one-way street, work with me and it would be lovely to bring the whole show back,” he added.

Asked if he had a message for residents upset by the removal of the artwork, Mr Brandler said: “Somebody told me it belongs to the people of Nottingham – no, it belonged to the person whose wall it was on.

“From what I hear they offered it to a number of organisations in Nottingham and nobody was interested.

“It’s very easy to say ‘we must keep it’ – all right, you pay for it, you pay for the maintenance, the security, the insurance, the restoration.”

The Banksy is one of several Mr Brandler has purchased, including Season’s Greetings in Port Talbot, Wales.