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Kate Moss, 2005

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Kate Moss, 2005
Stencil spray-paint on canvas
80×80 cm (31 1/2 x 31 1/2 inches)
Edition: 5

Exhibited
Crude Oils, London, 2005

Exhibited in Banksy’s first, landmark gallery exhibition, Crude Oils: A Gallery of Re-Mixed Masterpieces: Vandalism and Vermin, in October 2005, Kate Moss (2005) is an exceptionally rare canvas work by the artist, one of his limited experimentations with screen-print and the fifth of an exclusive edition of five. Famous for his stenciled graffiti works that appear on streets around the world, British-born Banksy has amassed a legion of fans for his distinctive oeuvre, defined by dark humor, satire, and his tongue-in-cheek political commentary. With Kate Moss, Banksy turns to the masters of Western art history, making a series of iconic oil paintings the site of his vandalism. A 21st Century take on an archetypal masterpiece, Banksy reformulates Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe, replacing the face of the era-defining American actress, model and singer, with that of British supermodel Kate Moss, an instantly discernible figure from popular culture, her face definitive of the turn of the century.
ANDY WARHOL, BLUE MARILYN, 1962, ACRYLIC AND SCREEN PRINT INK ON CANVAS. © 2021 THE ANDY WARHOL FOUNDATION FOR THE VISUAL ARTS, INC. / LICENSED BY ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK.
Paying homage to arguably one of the most famous artists of the 20th century, Pop artist Andy Warhol, Banksy combines the face of Kate Moss with the hair and trademark beauty spot of Marilyn, adopting the exact bright aesthetic and composition of his predecessor’s influential Marilyn Monroe series. Juxtaposing the warm honey hues of Marilyn’s hair with the striking cyan of the background, Kate Moss is expressive of Warhol’s mastery of color, wonderfully embodied by Banksy approximately 40 years later. Using a still from the 1953 movie Niagara, Warhol first featured the image of Marilyn Monroe in his work shortly after her death in 1962, subsequently releasing his well-known screen-print series on the subject in 1967. Embracing popular culture and commercial processes such as printmaking, Warhol appropriated imagery from his environment, his work both reflective of and instrumental in defining American culture. In the same way Andy Warhol and Marilyn Monroe are symbolic of American popular culture in the 1950s and 1960s, Banksy uses the memorable face of Kate Moss to reflect society and culture at the start of the 21st century, a type of historical document reflective of the context in which it was made in 2005. Voted one of the world’s most 100 influential people in 2007 by Time magazine, Moss has appeared in hundreds of magazine covers over the course of her 30-year career, making her an obvious choice for Marilyn’s 21st Century replacement by Banksy. Further, by embracing Warhol as his subject, Banksy makes subtle reference to the Pop artist’s embodiment of consumerism and the hyper-capitalism of 1960s America, which he interrogates further in the exhibition, Crude Oils: A Gallery of Re-Mixed Masterpieces: Vandalism and Vermin.
Crude Oils: A Gallery of Re-Mixed Masterpieces: Vandalism and Vermin at 100 Westbourne Grove in London was a milestone event in the artist’s career, Banksy’s first conventional show in a gallery setting. Amongst its visitors, Banksy included 164 rats in the space, unnerving the audience and creating an almost Surrealist experience where everything was not quite as it seemed. In his series of subversive paintings, the artist hijacks significant masterpieces that would be immediately recognizable to the viewer, disrupting the various scenes with objects and sentiments from our present age.

In doing so, Banksy directly engages with the legacy of Western art history, in a manner not dissimilar to Marcel Duchamp’s infamous interpretation of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, L.H.O.O.Q. in 1919, in which the Dada artist drew a moustache and goatee on a postcard reproduction of the work. However, Banksy takes his artistic disruption further, executing his works in the style and technique of their original makers, adopting the screenprint technique typical of Warhol’s process in Kate Moss.

Not only does Banksy appropriate Warhol’s most famous motif, the face of Marilyn Monroe, the artist also places his playful stamp on the works of Vincent Van Gogh, Claude Monet, Jack Vettriano and Edward Hopper. Littering Monet’s Impressionist masterpiece of a water garden in Giverny with a traffic cone and partly submerged, upended shopping trolleys, Banksy highlights the reality of our world, dismantling these idealized visions from the past.

BANKSY, SHOW ME THE MONET, 2005, OIL ON CANVAS, IN ARTIST’S FRAME, SOTHEBYS LONDON, 21 OCTOBER 2020, SOLD FOR US$9,924,563

Alongside Kate moss and Banksy’s Monet, Show Me The Monet, the artist depicts Van Gogh’s seminal sunflowers in a state of decay; a Renaissance portrait of the Virgin and Child listening to an iPod; and the sculpture of Venus with a traffic cone on her head, taking the audience through a reimagined view of art history.

Banksy’s Kate Moss is an ebullient, rare example from the artist’s oeuvre, executed using screen-print on canvas, strikingly different to the street art interventions which had previously gained him notoriety. Neither the first nor the last to immortalize the great Kate Moss in art—her likeness reproduced by artists such as Marc Quinn, as seen in his arresting golden sculpture, Song of the Siren (2010)—Banksy’s work draws upon past icons of popular culture to create an emblematic image, definitive of 21st century art.

The Marilyn Monroe (Marilyn) screen-prints are one of Andy Warhol’s most revered and recognized portfolios. Known for his fascination for the glitz and glamour that fame offers, Marilyn Monroe was one of Warhol’s earliest muses. Warhol used a publicity shot from Marilyn’s movie Niagara in 1953, taken by Gene Korman. Marilyn reached fame as an actress, but Warhol was fascinated about how her fame grew exponentially after her tragic death in August 1962. Warhol immortalized the actress in an almost propagandist nature. It has been said that Warhol created an icon out of an icon.
The Marilyn Monroe (Marilyn) full suite was printed in 1967 by Aetna Silkscreen Products, New York. A portfolio of ten different screen-prints on paper, each in edition of 250 signed in pencil and numbered with a rubber stamp on verso. Some of these prints are initialed on verso and some are dated. There were also 26 AP signed and lettered A-Z on verso printed for each image.
The Marilyn portfolio is seen as an extension of the initial silkscreen paintings Warhol started in 1962. Each image from the portfolio is sized 36×36 inches and shows a close crop of Marilyn’s face. Each print is vibrantly colored to reflect her vivacious personality. In many of the prints, her iconic lips are boldly colored a deep red. Many of the prints also emphasize her platinum blonde hair by adding variants of yellow. In one of the prints, the actress is colored in silver and black, a stark departure from its vivid counterparts. This recalls the effect of watching the actress on the cinema screen in black and white. The dark colors are also clearly a somber reminder of the actress’s passing. The colors ultimately bring to life Marilyn Monroe’s iconic status and celebrity glamour. By creating repetitive imagery, Warhol evokes her ubiquitous celebrity status.
Kate Moss was first released in 2005 in light blue as an edition of 50 prints signed. Shortly afterwards, another series of 120 prints was released in six different colorways: Pink, Apricot/Gold, Blue/Grey, Green/Turquoise, Red/Lime, and Purple/Red with 20 prints of each. All prints are signed by the artist. In 2011, Banksy created a unique edition for Kate Moss herself, as a wedding gift on the occasion of her honeymoon, where she was surprised to find the artwork in her hotel bathroom waiting for her.
Kate Moss (Original), 2005
Screen-print in colors on wove paper
70×70 cm (27 1/2 x 27 1/2 inches)
Edition: 50 signed

Gallery

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