Alex Schaefer, an artist in Los Angeles, just sold this painting of a burning Chase bank branch on eBay for a cool $25,000. Great imagery! It helped that he got a shitload of publicity, from two(!) police investigations.

"They told me that somebody had called and said they felt threatened by my painting," [after he set up his easel in front of a Chase branch] said Schaefer, 41, of Eagle Rock.

"They said they had to find out my intention. They asked if I was a terrorist and was I going to follow through and do what I was painting."

Thanks, fearful capitalists! Now Alex Schaefer is painting a whole series of burning bank building paintings and they're all selling for thousands of dollars. People simply cannot get enough of burning banks, in a purely symbolic sense! Burning bank paintings are a far better investment than bank stocks.

[LAT. Photo via Ebay]