About five years ago we went down to L.A. to see an exhibit by BANKSY -in a little house gallery in Silverlake (L.A.). We loved his street art and thought it'd be great to meet him and go to the after party that was in a little warehouse in an industrial area downtown. The exhibit had about 20 pieces....his stencils transposed to canvases, prices starting at about $150-$200. We weren't that into them, we thought they were better on the streets...still do feel that way.
Well Bonham UK just held the "world's first urban art auction" tonight and there's one of those canvas pieces from the L.A. show (pictured above)...it went for $121,000. Banksy dominated the sales although Blek LeRat, Faile, D*Face and Nick Walker did well, Keith Haring seemed to pale in comparison. Bonham says: Exciting, fresh, edgy and challenging, interest for works was fever-pitch throughout the sale with 99% of the work selling - a truly extraordinary phenomenon that the market has never seen before. In other words, we had no idea what a cash cow this was going to be!
Any one that's thinking street art is not a viable genre of art for the history books...think again. This is just getting started. (In Banksy's hometown of Bristol, the city is trainining cleaning crews to recognize Banksy work so they won't buff it....he's important to the promotion of the city.) The good news is there are so many amazing artists with incredible talent that are still affordable that if you're an emerging collector, there's definitely room on the ground floor.
You can see the Bonham auction results here. (btw, we never did get to meet Banksy...that would've been nice.)