Happy Choppers

Happy Choppers belongs to the 2003 group — with Laugh Now and Bomb Hugger — that was released before there was a secondary market to speak of, and which the entire print trade was subsequently built on.

That history is worth understanding as an owner. These were inexpensive when issued and were bought by people who wanted the picture, not by collectors. Provenance is therefore frequently thin, documentation is often missing, and condition varies far more widely than it does for a print released into an established market.

The signed edition is reported at 150 against 600 unsigned. The ratio matters more on the early images than on the later ones, because demand for this group has held up while supply has not grown.

Signed impressions trade well above unsigned, and within each the condition spread is wide. A well-kept unsigned sheet can be worth more than a poor signed one, which is not what most owners expect and is exactly why the sheet needs looking at rather than the edition being priced from a table.

Pest Control certification is what the major salerooms expect to see, and works of this age frequently reach us without it because the certificate scheme postdates the release.

That does not make a print unsaleable. It changes the route and the likely result, and it is worth establishing the position before approaching a saleroom rather than during a consignment.