Kate Moss
Warhol's Marilyn, with Kate Moss in the frame. Issued in colourway sets at fifty apiece, which makes this the scarcest tier in the mainstream print output and the one where the colour is the valuation.
Pictures on Walls · 2005
Edition summary
| Year | 2005 |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Pictures on Walls |
| Medium | Screenprint on paper |
| Signed edition | Reported as 50 per colourway |
| Unsigned edition | None recorded |
| Variants | Issued in colourway sets; artist's proofs and dual-signed examples recorded separately |
| Authentication | Buyers and salerooms expect a Pest Control certificate |
Fifty of each, and the colour decides everything
This is the scarcest tier in the regular print output: editions of fifty per colourway rather than the 150 and 600 of the surrounding releases.
Because each colourway is its own small edition, the colour is not a cosmetic preference — it is the identification and most of the value. Two Kate Mosses can be a long way apart on price with nothing separating them in a photograph but the palette, and owners regularly describe what they have simply as a Kate Moss without naming the colourway, which makes a figure impossible to give.
Borrowing Warhol, and who buys it
The composition is Warhol's Marilyn with the face replaced, which places the print in a conversation about appropriation that the artist has returned to repeatedly.
Commercially it widens the audience: this image reaches buyers who collect Pop and portraiture as well as those who collect the artist, which is unusual in this catalogue and tends to support the price. Sets — several colourways held together — are scarcer again than individual sheets and should never be broken up before taking advice.
Proofs and dual-signed examples
Artist's proofs and examples carrying more than one signature are recorded separately and sit above the standard fifty.
These are exactly the sheets that get undervalued when a work is assessed from an image of the picture. Read the pencil line, photograph it, and do not assume an annotation is a defect.
Before you buy or sell one
- Name the colourway. Without it no figure is possible — each is its own edition of fifty.
- If you hold a set, say so before anything is sold; sets are scarcer than the sheets that make them up.
- Read the pencil line for proof designations and additional signatures.
- Confirm the Pest Control certificate corresponds to this edition number specifically.
Keep reading
- Girl with Balloon
- Love Is In The Air
- Di-Faced Tenner
- Trolleys (Black and White)
- Trolleys (Colour)
- Rude Copper
- Laugh Now
- Bomb Hugger
- Happy Choppers
- Napalm
- Toxic Mary
- Flying Copper
- Pulp Fiction
- Barcode
- Gangsta Rat
- Jack and Jill
- Soup Can
- Grin Reaper
- Morons
- Applause
- Sale Ends
- Stop and Search
- Very Little Helps
- Nola
- Choose Your Weapon
- What the reported figures actually show
- Pest Control authentication explained
No work described here is offered for sale. Whitebank Fine Art is an art advisory and gallery, not an auction house, and is not affiliated with Banksy, Pest Control, Pictures on Walls or any auction house. Only Pest Control can authenticate a work by Banksy. Nothing here is investment or legal advice.
Own one? Send photographs of the full sheet and the pencil line and we will identify the colourway.

