Urban Art Association

Agreed. People are free to spend their money on what they want and unfortunately true collectors, like Howlinhooker, aren't left with much choice if they want to keep their Banksy collection going. But anyone spending this kind of money on high edition prints as an investment is going to get a nasty surprise in the long-term, IMO.

i can share your frustrations Printguru, i too have been looking in to alternative works by household name artists and have been staggered by their relative affordability when compared to street artists!

Banksy though is exceptional, his collectors demographic is far more broad than a lot of more traditional artists and the increase in value and scarcity of his works means more serious collectors are now on board.
anyone from Bankers, Builders to premier league footballers want to own a piece of him and this presents a lot of the problems you allude to, many of us would love a Bridget Riley - i fucking would - but many Banksy fans would not have a clue beyond say Hirst and Warhol.

it also means each new release becomes more of a bunfight than the last as you have professional flippers employing teams to buy on their behalf, genuine collectors who love the image and want to own it and other collectors who like the image but would prefer to trade for an older Banksy that they previously missed out on.

i'm glad you got something you're equally happy with, Hockney is an amazing artist and you can be confident that your purchase will not bomb at a later date, my CYW is going nowhere and i'm certain i'll always get my £450 back on it but if i was considering spending 3 large on one i'd have to consider that i may not see all of that back should i choose to sell.

that said, i own Adam Neate work that is worth probably half what i paid for it, do i care? do i fuck, if anything it means i can enjoy it for exactly what it is and the money i spent is good value to me, to have it in my life.
maybe those paying silly money for a CYW feel the same?

A thoughful considered post printguru. I've mentioned this on another thread, but I recently commissioned a young artist to produce a 21x29 painting. It's amazing, I have a personal connection to it, and it cost £450. The source price for Banksy, without taking into account the thousands the flippers are now making.

I know this is primarily a Banksy forum, but there is a whole wide world with a whole lot of good art out there.

Got to agree.

It's easy to lose track of the fact that 3 or 4k is a hell of a lot of money but we become a bit complacent about the numbers when dealing with high priced Banksy stuff on a weekly basis.

He's certainly flavour of the millenium with most of us on the forum but in reality there is a lot of other classic art out there that can be picked up at more realistic and affordable prices.

I'm about to add Matisse, Cezanne and Warhol to my collection in a trade and the combined value still wouldn't get me a Banksy that the ink is still wet on.

Everything that was said is true, signed Banksy prints are trading at quite crazy prices already.

2 Picasso (signed and numbered prints) I own are way cheaper than CYW. An other one is about the same price that an unsigned rude copper...

Cheaper than Choose Your Weapon :





About U/S rude copper :



I'm happy to have grabbed an LA2 OG (thanks to Jon) for way cheaper than the Banksy Choose Your Weapon :

I am liking this thread, lets see some more examples.

Snausages, who was the artist?

Love that, I've a blackbook with an LA2 sketch in it.
Nice...

Interesting thread and to be fair, Hopper's Mao will go for 150k minimum (I'd guess 200+) which is well outside of Kate. I also enjoy the electric chair prints and happily owned one over a decade ago (the orange one with a brushstroke) but 8 of the 10 are rather lackluster and thus the discount to that edition. We all wish a similar discount existed for their canvas counterparts. The reason you get Warhol signed editions even in the neighborhood of a signed Banksy edition is because you're talking 100k+ Warhol signed prints to less than 5k in the case of Banksy. There is so much editioned Warhol out there that it weighs on the market and because of it, from a strict market standpoint there are essentially 2 iconic Warhol editions (Marilyn and Mao of which there are 5k signed examples which exceeds Banksy's total output).

To your point on Lichtenstein, much less prolific than Warhol with both paintings and signed editioned work and yet the best of his editioned work regularly commands far more than Warhol's. Even the lesser editioned works (a tiny hot dog for instance) will sell for the price of a Marilyn because there are 3 of the former and 2500 of the latter. His signed editions are some of the best in the business for my eyes like the entire blue nude editions but those are $150k minimum anymore and can escalate in price quickly depending on image and condition.

Most of us here are far too young to dabble in the iconic imagery of the pop movement but we can with this movement and that's ultimately the rub, at least it was for me. My entryway to the art market was through the pop movement and personally I hit a point maybe 5 or 6 years ago of frustration (somewhat akin to the first post in this thread though obviously different) with some of the imagery that I had collected not continuing to stimulate me as it once did. It was a combination of many factors but it boiled down to the thought of decorative examples from pop could be traded for iconic images from this movement. I can well appreciate anyone who enjoys work from yesterday with historical context on their walls but my preference (with the mrs) morphed from that train of thought to wanting the art of our time on the walls instead. Simple as that really but it took years to realize it; I'm a slow learner I suppose.

I love and collect the work of Banksy because it speaks to me in a way that little else does. The points made earlier that one could buy something of historical context for the same cost of Banksy on the secondary market are true (in some aspects) and yes you may or may not be better off in terms of investment. Still, you have something from a previous generations time on your wall and there are hosts of collectors that have no interest whatsoever in that type of collection (anymore). That certainly accounts for a portion of the hysteria we all witness firsthand for something new.

Speaking of Hockney, who can advise the best place to get one (at the same price as a Choose Your Weapon (to keep this post relevant to the thread)). Preferably a piece with colour.

I totally agree with you lee. I think that's why we are all here. I buy street art in general not limiting it Banksy because that's what speaks to me. All of what you said is totally true.

To gentlemantal, I think that you are wrong about Banksy's client base. It's actually all the pretentious t**ts that made his current price. Rich collectors, important auction houses and tycoons are the one buying his stuff. They're not maybe buying his prints but they are the one buying his OG. When you think about it, outside the UK what auction houses are selling Banksy's art? Mainly Christie's, Sotheby's, Philips de Pury and Bonham US branch..

The Frenzy came with the fact that apart from Banksy satyrical and artistical talent, he was largely broadcasted all over the world. Allowing anyone to understand and appreciate his work. As I already said before, in my opinion, people are also queuing because he doesn't release much and he publish at a huge discount to its proper value. Even loyal Banksy collectors are buying them because they can afford the works and they know as well that at some point if they ever need the money, it will come their way. Different than 6 years ago when people where paying £35 for his work just because they liked it.

in my humble opinion, making a living from your art is totally different to making a profit from it.
It seems the only people who truly profit from art are 'rarely' the artists themselves...

PM sent winter

THANKS !!!!!!!!!coach !!!

Good thread, and some very good posts.

I went through a phase, and still am, where I am exploring the possibility of perhaps selling a few signed Banksy's and purchasing a few pieces from the World renowned artists like Picasso, Warhol for the one reason of price and value for money.

My concern however is three fold:

1. I know very little about the artists and what to look for in the way of provenance - there are a lot of fakes out there and I don't know what to look for and know few people who can advise me (Brushstokes has been a help in this).

2. Ultimately for the same price you're not getting a quality piece of art necessarily (perhaps a drawing or a poor sketch, with all due respect to those that collect them) and basically just buying the name on the bottom corner. A CYW may be an edition of 25 but it is a quality print and very limited in number - this is making a huge presumption but what would a Warhol screenprint, ed. 25, fetch today at auction (a question for Lee3 perhaps).

3. Finally, another concern is that, admittedly because my knowledge is not great, most of the work by Picasso or the Pop artists for example, don't mean much me. Banksy's work speaks volumes, connects to me in a way no other artists' work do, and for that reason I collect it and happy to pay the same amount as a lesser work by an established artist.