Banksy, Save or Delete Jungle Book, 2001 (est. £60,000-80,000, realized £78,000), via Bonhams

Tuesday night’s auction of Urban Art at Bonhams in London – the fourth auction of its kind the house has mounted – realized just over £455,000 for 51 of 67 lots sold. Attesting to interest in the artist following the release of his film Exit Through the Gift Shop, ten Banksy lots offered at the sale accounted for approximately half of the evening’s earnings. The top lot was Banksy’s Save or Delete Jungle Book, which sold for £78,000 against presale estimates of £60,000-80,000. The image was created for a poster campaign about deforestation but was never circulated due to copyright issues with Disney.

Shepard Fairey, Peace Goddess on Wood, 2008 (est. £8,000-12,000, realized £27,600), via Bonhams

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Art Observed was on site at Os Gêmeos and Futura2000’s eighty-foot mural, titled “The Giant Project,” at P.S. 11, William T. Harris elementary school in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood. Os Gêmeos are twin brothers Otavio and Gustavo Pandolfo, a graffiti-art collaborative from São Paulo, Brazil.  Last summer the duo completed a large mural on Houston and Bowery on the wall that currently displays Barry McGee’s work, and Shepard Fairey’s before that.

Os Gêmeos, The Giant Project, 2010. All images by Art Observed

According to their website, “The project was organized by Allen Benedikt (from AKANYC and 12ozProphet.com) with support from the artists, AKANYC, Montana Colors, and the Nike World Basketball Festival.”

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Futura, Jules de Balincourt, Dustin Yellin, Eric White, Tom Sachs, Shepard Fairey, Jeffrey Deitch, Lance Armstrong, Mark Parker, Geoff McFetridge, José Parlá, Dzine posing in front of a painting by Cai Guo Qiang; photo courtesy of Black Frame

A day before seven bicycles with frames designed by contemporary artists, and used by Lance Armstrong in his comeback season for July’s Tour de France, raised $1.3 million, an exhibition of artwork commissioned to benefit the legendary cyclist’s cancer foundation opened at Deitch Projects.  Launched in Paris at Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, STAGES- the exhibit comprised of commissioned works created by over twenty established contemporary artists, is currently on view at New York’s Deitch Projects. Artists involved include Cai Guo-Qiang, Rosson Crow, Shepard Fairey, KAWS, Yoshitomo Nara, Catherine Opie, Os Gemeos, Raymond Pettibon, Andreas Gursky, Richard Prince, Ed Ruscha and Tom Sachs. STAGES will run through November 21, 2009.  AO interviews some of the artists to find out their personal connection to the cause of STAGES, their view on creating commissioned work and the story of their involvement with the project powered by Lance Armstrong Foundation and Nike and its goal of raising awareness of cancer.

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Rosson Crow in front of her piece “Texas Cycle Show”

Works presented in STAGES manifest not merely a vast array of mediums and stylistic approaches, they also speak of a multitude of equally appropriate paths the artists have taken in building the show.

Rosson Crow about STAGES: “This whole thing is incredible and overwhelming, it is a really awesome show with a great cause. Charity work is something that I love doing so this was a really cool opportunity. This painting that I did for the show is called ‘Texas Cycle Show’ and is based on an 1800′ cycle exposition. I made it Texas because both Lance and I are from Texas… kind of bringing the historical Texas vibe… and of course the bicycles I thought were perfect for a Lance Armstrong show [laughs]” When asked about any personal connections that the artist has with the cause, Rosson Crow comments that “it is hard to find anybody whose life has not been affected by cancer, so I think that everybody has a personal relationship to it in some way.”

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Yoshitomo Nara, “Fire” via STAGES

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