KLF Man’s Latest Smiley Riot Shields (Almost) Sell Out
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Jimmy Cauty revealed this week that the latest limited (Glitter) edition of his hand painted smiley riot shields is about to sell out, despite each shield now costing £1,000.
The first edition of the ‘battle scarred ex UK police issue’ painted smiley artworks first appeared two years ago painted acid house yellow for £325 after the KLF guru managed to track down a supply of shields in the North of England.
“It takes time and effort to acquire the right raw materials,” he told Skrufff at the time, “It depends on how many riots there have been lately.”
Admitting he nowadays tried to keep a low profile (‘I do all my rioting from an arm-chair’) he was otherwise philosophical about the message behind his art.
“It’s too late to change the world. If I could achieve an image on the (ITV) News at 10 of a thousand school kids running down Whitehall with smiley riot shields then that would be something worthwhile. I know the reality is different and the shields will mostly end up on office walls in Shoreditch,” he predicted.
“The message lately has been all about projecting forward into a dystopian future and reporting back what I find there, usually it’s messy and involves thousands of police, like in the aftermath dislocation principle, but I think it’s interesting for us to see what could happen in the future if we are not careful.” (Skrufff)
