...yeah ok, but seriously let's not overlook his sudden popularity is much more so based on the fact that his lame ass moona lisa sold for a billion dollars at Bonhams because some idiot thought it was a Banksy.

His TMA gimmick has gotten old right quick don't ya think? It was an ok image to begin with but it's not the show stopper you guys are acting like it is. He's going to run out of things to paint rainbow streaks on pretty soon anyway.

...yeah ok, but seriously let's not overlook his sudden popularity is much more so based on the fact that his lame ass moona lisa sold for a billion dollars at Bonhams because some idiot thought it was a Banksy.
[/quote]

How stupid is that thinking! It must have been at least 2 or 3 people in that case to push it up to that price. A well known 'celebrity' went up to 40k on it (knowing who it was by) and NW knows who bought it as they have been in touch. So stick that in your pipe..

giant glittery butterfly!

DOn't kid yourselves folks, everything at Bonhams was bid up to really stupid prices by people who had no f**king clue what 'urban art' really is — this dramatic of a rise in prices (up to £30 f**king thousand for a canvas?) on an artist based on a single auction result and rampant flipping is going to leave a lot of people burned.

I saw Ian Brown, but he was bidding on the old monkey.

Anyone want to go halves on a Butterfly/boat print?
You can have the butterfly and I'll have the boat?

There have been some seriously ill informed posts on this and other threads.

I'll try to address each nonsense in turn -

To label TMA series a gimmick is laughable. Does that make Banksy's Rat's and his and Warhols cans a gimmick. There are numerous such like 'Gimmick's' woven into the fabric of art historyl if thats the case. I won't go on.

I guess by the same token Micallefs career is f**ked if we're going down the 'Rainbow logic!!..' route?

As for Bonhams and the Moona being bought by some bonus eyed fool from the city your wrong, the underbidders were both very knowledgable and respected in the street art genre

As for all this b**ching by those so say 'about to pull the trigger' on a peice of Nick's is laughable, the only reason that 75% of people on are whining is purely down to, money and greed and that print x is now worth x ammount more than it was pre Bonhams & LA.

I appreciate that there are a lot of people new to Nick's work who are now unable to buy a piece down to the mad prices.

Let's not kid ourselves though folks that this is something that's not happened overnight, for years now Nick has repped himself after splitting from Scrawl collective and has produced a body of work that is comparable to many lauded names dead or alive in the street art world.

Banksy called him an enigma and if anyone's held him back then it's POW who (from the numerous works that people are salivatting over) only chose to do his worst reworking of The Mona Lisa and one of his worst images, very strange as they are the leading/most trumpeted printhouse's with it's routes in graff.
Oh sorry they did do a black Marge Simpson! WTF

There were many who new that Bristol had the TWO of best stencil/graff artists in our midst. For those with short memories or the inability to look past the end of your nose, just take time out of your bitter vision and read Nick's bio (see below). A man who has grafted his way to the top, his work well respected amongst his peers and a very nice gent.

Bristol born artist Nick Walker emerged from the now infamous & ground breaking Wild Bunch/Bristol Sound scene of the early 1980’s. It was from the artistic element that spawned Nick aka Ego.

It was over two decades ago, when the baby faced B-Boy was in his mid teens, he walked into the Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol and walked out with an agreement with them to host a group graffiti show. He conceptualized, curated & exhibited work within this breakthrough exhibition, simply titled ‘Graffiti Art in Bristol’, and featured the work of 3D, Z- Boys, Fade, Jaffa, Pride and Scot Stevens. This was one of the first times in the UK that street work had been given a legitimate showcase from the outside in.

This elevated Nick from ‘Vandal’ (a recurring theme in his work to date) to Artist and created opportunities for him to paint the film sets of movies ranging from Judge Dredd to Hackers, B-Monkey and Stanley Kubrick's, Eyes Wide Shut. It was during this brief move away from street work that he shed his infamous EGO tag and re-emerged as Nick Walker the Apish Angel.

As a forerunner to Banksy and the now mainstream British stencil/graffiti phenomenon, he has always been a pioneer of his field. Constantly evolving and pushing the boundaries of traditional graffiti by combining intricate stencil images with his conventional freehand methods, his work has always been without fear of being pigeon holed and always remains artistically landscaped, constantly innovative and thought provoking. In more recent years his distinctive style has effortlessly made the transition from world streets to gallery walls leading to him show his work worldwide by taking part in solo and group shows in London, Canada, Tokyo, Berlin, Taiwan and numerous venues in the US. He has featured in numerous publications, and features heavily in books written by graff’s sage Tristan Manko’s

His highly acclaimed 2006 Bristol show titled ‘The Art of Nick Walker’ took a retrospective look at his work from 1994 to present. This was quickly followed up by the release of his piece titled ‘The Moona Lisa’ which stole the show at POW’s annual shin-dig, ‘Santa’s Ghetto’. The old girl even getting her ‘cheeks’ out on the BBC’s coverage of the event for News Night. Having conceived and cut this the latest of subversions of the ‘worlds most famous portrait’, Nick painted the image for the first time at the Nuart, music and Art festival (’06) held in Stavanger, Norway each September. The execution of the piece was caught on film and has received over 40,000 views on You Tube.

As well as the sold out ‘To have and To Hold’ show at The Wonderful Workshop in Bristol, 2007 has also seen his editions sell out at the Randall-Scott Gallery in Washington DC and feature in the ‘Found’ show at the Leonard Street Gallery, London. Autumn 2007 will see him exhibit what he himself has referred to as his ‘hardest & most time consuming body of work to date’ in London. 2008 sees Nick kicking off with his first solo show in Los Angeles at the Carmichael gallery in February.

Nick continues to be hugely popular in the UK and worldwide.
The true gent of the street art scene (yes, way before it went showbiz!); ladies and gents, I give you Nick Walker aka The Apish Angel and man of many hats!

right on brother

Standing-O!

I question without trying to make people laugh... With the on-line release of the 2 prints - can I buy a copy of both prints or does BRP have a clause like POW about only 1 per customer...

Not if you are in line with your extended family and you all have PDA's and are able to get both multiple copies online and from the Q!

I went to Black Rat Press today and was lucky enough to see the new Nick Walker work on display, look out for 'V for vandalism' being projected onto the houses of parliament tonight! I was also lucky enough to see a pre-release version of Blek le Rat's new book, has some great photography, there will be a limited edition run with slipcovers as well, an essential purchase i'm sure. A lot of the bigger Nick Walker canvasses have sold already, there is a run of 75 prints that will be available on Thursday though. All in all a great day!

Cool. Cant wait to see the art. Are there lots of new pieces??

You wish...
It will be another 10 pages of talking about queues, moaning about missing on the prints, ranting on about flippers, posting the ebay listings 30 sec after the release and so on...

I hope I am wrong but somehow I doubt that.