A solid gold toilet artwork has been stolen from an exhibition at Blenheim Palace, forcing the artist Maurizio Cattelan to deny that the theft was a Banksy-style hoax.
The artwork, reportedly worth between $5 million and $6 million, was part of a solo exhibition by Italian artist Cattelan titled Victory is Not an Option, which opened on Thursday and was set to run until 27 October 2019.
Visitors were invited to book three-minute slots to use the fully functioning solid gold toilet, titled America.

According to Blenheim Palace's CEO Dominic Hare, the artwork was stolen in a "very fast smash-and-grab raid" at the historic Oxfordshire house in the early hours of Saturday 14 September.
However, speculation has arisen that the theft was a hoax to deliberately destroy the work, similar to the prank orchestrated by street artist Banksy, who sent his Girl With Balloon artwork through a shredder at the moment of its auction sale.
Italian artist Cattelan has denied staging the robbery, telling reporters that he "wished" it was indeed a prank.
"At first, when they woke me up this morning with the news, I thought it was a prank: Who's so stupid to steal a toilet" I had forgotten for a second that it was made out of gold," the artist said in an email to The New York Times.
"I wish it was a prank," said Cattelan, adding that the incident "is deadly serious if even a little bit surreal since the subject of the robbery was a toilet"....