Keith Coventry is best known for his paintings and sculpture that reflect his concerns with the social ills of urban living, the underbelly of city life. He was included in Sensation at the Royal Academy.

Throughout his work Coventry signals absent presences. Vandalised Benches operates because of what is missing; a lost function, a type of urban space and an act of violence. The piece makes you want to sit down, one can't help imagining the wooden slats that would restore this strange skeleton to its proper function. An object of municipal wish fulfillment, the bench is an Arcadian prop designed for pastoral strollers, for lovers talking, for strangers relaxing together. But through the artists brutal act this ideal function is shown to be an illusion.