Isle of Wight beach monolith removed and up for sale

A monolith erected on a British beach in tribute to others around the world has been removed and is up for sale.

Similar to ones in the US and Romania, the pillar sparked global headlines when it was found on the Isle of Wight off the south coast of England.

After it was found in pieces on Friday it was removed by the National Trust and has since been listed on eBay.

Tom Dunford, its creator, said he was "disappointed someone had decided to cash in on a broken monolith."

Bids on the monolith are at £730.00 to date.

Mr Dunford, 29, from Fishbourne, said he put the pillar on Compton Beach on 6 December for "fun".

He said: "If I'd have known it was going to be so epic then I would have made it from more robust materials and some good could have come out of it.

"It could have been used to raise some money for charity in an auction - that would have been the right thing to do."

The National Trust said the gleaming structure, which had attracted an influx of visitors, had been removed by beach cleaners after it had fallen down and was "partly broken up".

The charity said one of its rangers who had come to collect the pieces was "approached by an individual who asked if he could have the remains for his garden, so they were left for him to take away.

"A few minutes later, the individual handed over a cash donation, but the National Trust is returning this. We do not claim ownership of the monolith and do not want a donation to confuse that."

The BBC has made efforts to contact the eBay seller but has not yet had a response.

Mr Dunford previously said he decided to create the monolith after: "I saw the first one pop up [in Utah] I thought it was brilliant, the second one popped up and I had a text from a friend which said 'you're the man that can do this on the island'."

He admitted he did not expect it to get the global reaction it did.

A metal monolith appeared briefly in the Utah desert last month. It created wild speculation on social media and apparent copycats with two others found in southern California and Romania days later.

An anonymous collective called The Most Famous Artist has taken credit for the monoliths in Utah and California - it posted an image of the Utah monolith on Instagram, with a 45,000 US dollar (£34,000) price tag.

Elsewhere in the UK a monolith was also found on Dartmoor in the Devon national park near the village of Throwleigh and another in Glastonbury.

In 2001: A Space Odyssey - the 1968 film directed by Stanley Kubrick - imposing black monoliths created by an unseen alien species appear in the movie, based on the writings of novelist Arthur C Clarke.

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