Creed Gallery in Ascot, Berkshire, offers two signed screenprints by Blek le Rat, the Paris street artist often called the father of stencil graffiti: The Warrior (Blue) (2018, £2,250) and Paraphernalia (2016, £2,500), each from an edition of 300. Our team can advise on edition, framing and documentation for collectors across Berkshire, Surrey and London.
About Blek le Rat: The Father of Stencil Graffiti
Blek le Rat, born Xavier Prou in Boulogne-Billancourt in 1951, saw New York graffiti on a trip to the United States in 1971. He studied printmaking and then architecture, and in 1981 began painting on the walls of Paris, choosing the stencil as better suited to French architecture. He took his name from an Italian comic, Blek le Roc, and his first stencils were small black rats, since "rat" is an anagram of "art". In 1983 he began life-size stencils. Banksy has said that whenever he thinks he has done something original, he finds Blek le Rat did it first. Blek's work turned more political in the mid-2000s, when he pasted Paris with images of the kidnapped journalist Florence Aubenas, and he then began a series on beggars and the homeless.
Our Blek le Rat Prints
The Warrior (Blue) (2018) shows Blek's rat as a soldier holding a rifle with a flower in the barrel instead of a bullet, in a cool blue colourway. It is a four-colour screenprint on 300gsm Arches paper. Paraphernalia (2016) is a self-referential image of his tools of the trade: a rat in a flat cap and sunglasses holding a spray can, with a red rat darting away behind. It is a one-colour hand-pulled screenprint on 300gsm Arches. Each measures about 31 × 23 cm (40 × 32 cm framed), is signed by the artist, and comes from an edition of 300.
Collecting Blek le Rat at Creed Gallery
We state the edition, size, framing and documentation for every print, and whether it is an edition or a unique work. You're welcome to visit the gallery in Ascot.
Why Collect Blek le Rat
He started a whole approach to street art, and these prints carry his best-known motif. As with any artist, individual pieces vary in demand and value, so our team is happy to talk you through the specifics of any work you're considering.
