Bargain basement 'art' from eBay goes on show at Hayward Gallery

Sellers on eBay may be surprised to learn that their cast-offs are to feature as "works of art" at one of London's most prominent galleries.

The Hayward Gallery on the South Bank, has collected 103 items from the online sales site for an exhibition of anonymous paintings, artefacts and sculptures, called "View Basket".

What had been consigned as unwanted bric-a- brac and relegated to a dusty attic or a cobwebbed wardrobe, perhaps for years, will soon take pride of place on plinths, pedestals and wall displays at the gallery's project space.

Tom Morton, the exhibition's curator, amassed the ephemera after typing "conceptual" into eBay's search engine. The display, due to open on Thursday, is likely to reignite the debate on the line between "conceptual art" and pedestrian, everyday objects, which has raged since the birth of the Young British Artists' movement in the 1990s.

Among the highlights of the exhibition are: an unsigned work of the Hollywood Hills with an Afghan opium poppy farmer wearing an eye patch in the foreground; a bust of the singer, Freddie Mercury, dressed in a canary yellow jacket made from Lego; a late Victorian or early Edwardian portrait of a magistrate; a drawing of Harry Potter kissing his rival, Draco Malfoy; a My Little Pony toy with a gothic makeover; and miniature paintings for doll houses, including a Magritte copy.

Not all the artists are anonymous. Included in the exhibition is a limited edition copy of a Damien Hirst sculpture, entitled Snowblind. There is also a work by Tom of Finland, known for his homoerotic creations, which has the picture of a man wearing a cowboy hat staring at another man, on which someone has added the pencil note: "We will be outside Wimpy until 1.15..."

All the artwork was bought online over a 10-day period this month on a modest budget of £5,000, a sum that would not ordinarily buy even a fraction of a museum quality artwork.

The gallery hopes that the chosen pieces will reflect Britain's "hidden" art – works that have occupied people's homes rather than the public space of a gallery, offered for sale through the democratic marketplace of the internet.

Emphasising works by amateur, obscure and anonymous artists, the gallery said: "View Basket" was in part a showcase of "thrift store" art, with an aim to explore questions of how art is circulated, and how its provenance affects its cultural value."

The items were selected by Mr Morton and almost all were bought for £300 or under. "There are some fascinating things in people's homes which they put up for sale," he said. "They made me think, is this an object that someone is tired of, or was this given to someone by an old lover?

"They don't just have a financial value but also an emotional one. This is not art that someone would usually see in the Hayward. It belongs to the private space of the home.

"Every piece is, I think, visually interesting. Whe-ther it is good art and by what criteria it is judged, I leave up to the viewer."

The relationship between art and online sales sites such as eBay has a rich history, which includes notable events such as Bill Stoneham's The Hands Resist Him, also known as the eBay Haunted Painting. It became a hugely popular internet link in 2000, when it was posted for sale on eBay along with an story implying that it was haunted.

In 2002 Christoph Buchel auctioned his place in the European Biennial Manifesta on eBay. More recently, the German artist Klaus Weber exhibited 30 copies of Hugo Reinhold's sculpture Ape With Skull, bought on eBay in 2007.

"View Basket" will be on at the Hayward Gallery until 28 September