Original artwork description:

Popiconic moment 7: the birth of MTV." (On a box canvas.)

Urban Pop art in your own home by cult artist Sly.

Queen wanted to release Bohemian Rhapsody as a single in 1975. The record label executives insisted that, at 6 minutes, it was too long, and would never be a hit. The song was played to other musicians who said the band had no hope of it ever being played on the radio. Producer Roy Baker and the Band bypassed this corporate assessment by playing the song to D.J. Kenny Everett. The plan worked — Everett teased his listeners by playing only parts of the song. Audience demand intensified when Everett played the full song on his show 14 times in 2 days. Hordes of fans attempted to buy the single the following Monday, only to be told by record stores that it had not yet been released.
The song became the 1975 UK Christmas number one, holding the top spot for nine weeks.
A video was produced so that the band could avoid miming on Top of the Pops since they would have looked off miming such a complex song. Although "pop promos", as they were known at the time already existed, they were usually a straight video of the band performing. Queen's artistic efforts made this a watershed.
The video opens with a shot of the four band members standing in a diamond formation with their heads tilted back in near darkness. The lights fade up: this painting is the Popiconic moment when Mercury’s face is lit up and the MTV age was born.

Spiel by Steeve (with help from Wikipedia).


These are not prints as each is individually done and signed to order and consequently vary a little from the illustrated picture. These paintings are sprayed onto “chunky” box canvasses, 38 mm thick and ready to hang with no need for a frame.


(Also available on The Daily Telegraph, an Urbox, watercolour paper or plain paper at various prices if you search elsewhere.)

It is likely that Juan Sly has become the biggest seller of original artworks in the UK. An artist exhibiting in mainly spray stencils and oils. He has exhibited at the Saatchi (a proper gallery with pillars and everything!) alongside the likes of Banksy, Terry O'Neil, Tracy Emin and Vic Reeves and now has a permanent collections in Germany, Detroit and UK, alongside Damien Hirst and some other artists you might have heard of plus private collections around the globe. His works rock from humour to anti-war, sex to surreal. Particularly fond of the stencil medium as it allows him to quickly respond to events and ideas and gives the work that gritty illegal look. Stencils naturally allow the works to be resprayed and so become affordable and disposable. He likes the fact that people can buy art that they like and not to show off how much they can afford. You can find them in bedsits, legal offices in the Temple or stuck to a fence in Bristol.


Spiel by Steeve.

Materials used:

Spray paint

Tags: