So The Dude changes the Black Spot in the eyes for an "X" ..?? Genius!!??

Absolute must for a kids room

Here is what is written on the glass transfer in the window of my towns Uniqlo verbatim;

Collaboration between kaws the innovative artist who continues to captivate fans worldwide with his elegant and witty collections, and “Sesame Street”. Enjoy the playful graphics with a new pair of eyes, featuring the iconic street sign and characters like Elmo, creatively interpreted by KAWS.

Apart from the clunky construction, there's a few points I find quite weird. Firstly I don't consider Kaws to be a particularly 'witty' artist. Clever for sure, but it's not exactly humour. So what is the 'iconic street sign', my guess here they are referring to the eyes. Well is that really an 'iconic street sign', I feel it's more of a motif.

No mention of the fact these childhood characters have been killed off and perhaps re-born. Seems like they're simply attempting to sanitise this underling darkness to not upset the public.

Presumably they mean with the staff discount.  They are trying to stop employees flipping them.

They restocked then endlessly. The black ones were the only ones I saw lingering in NYC. This is his second run of Sesame Street, he did some stuff early summer

defying categorisation? I'm not sure if he's claiming this is 'art', isn't that just something we're projecting onto it. It seems as though people want artists to 'brand' themselves, (often ignoring those that don't) but when they do, we're going to set parameters on them?

I completely understand what you're saying, which is partly why I started the thread in the first place. Kaws has made paintings where arguably all he has done is crossed out the eyes and it'll sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars. So if that is art, why should it not be art when it's applied to an affordable soft toy. Is it now monetary value that defines something as art or not? Sounds to me like double standards.

That's the thing, I think you only get a box if you get the box set. Otherwise they just chuck it in the paper Kaws bag which they're already giving out with clothes purchases. I know I want an Ernie ... for my baby of course. For some reason Bert is the only one not on display.

the dead eyes make it instantly recognisable to those in the know as having Kaws do his thing on it.

I'm not sure how I feel about an artist having to brand themselves anyhow. It's just how things are these days in all fields. So if this cheapens it I couldn't care less, however this sort of mass merchandising doesn't appear to be having a negative effect on auction prices. Murakami does it even more so.

To some extent I think there can be comparisons made with Banksy soup cans. I don't think many question if those are art or not, but they were also unlimited, were also a reasonably small alteration and reference to an existing artwork/theme and comparable prices (inflation and all that)

That's fair.

I actually agree with your previous post, if it's art then it's also art applied to mere toys since art is not meant to be primarily about money as too many here seem to think. People (here) get very touchy about their favourite artist and sometimes it makes it difficult to even hold a decent conversation with unconditional (hardcore) apostles as soon as one challenges or simply questions anything related to said artist (semi God).

well you sound knowledgeable enough about Kaws. I've also read a fair bit of background about the artist and followed his progress over the years. So I'm still curious as to what I 'should know' and evidently do not. I like learning things

you're telling me I should know stuff but don't, yet won't explain what it is I don't know, and you call me condensing !! .. well. Look this is not about me, so will try to steer discussion back to what this all means. I know there has been some chatter here and I genuinely appreciate it if you've contributed, but I've also been here years and I know how conversation on Kaws is so heavily weighted on values, I'm probably as guilty as anyone else for that. I don't think I've read much lately, but I got a few ideas, and more into discussion than d**k waving.