KAWSKAWS Companion 2016 (Brown KAWS Companion)2016
2016
About the Item
- Creator:KAWS (American)
- Creation Year:2016
- Dimensions:Height: 11 in (27.94 cm)Width: 5 in (12.7 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:NEW YORK, NY
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU354310973682
KAWS
In the beginning, Brian Donnelly was just a kid from Jersey City, New Jersey, who got into the graffiti thing. KAWS was his tag, chosen simply because he liked the way it looked. Today, KAWS creates all kinds of art — there are KAWS figures and toys, sculptures and colorful drawings, paintings and prints that appropriate pop phenomena like the Smurfs, the Simpsons and SpongeBob SquarePants.
In the late 1990s, the artist, a 1996 graduate of New York’s School of Visual Arts, was making a living as an illustrator for the animation studio Jumbo Pictures. Like young Hansel and Gretel with their trail of crumbs, KAWS would mark the morning route to his downtown Manhattan office with “subvertising,” “interrupting” fashion advertisements by adding his colorful character Bendy, its sinuous length sliding playfully around the likes of a Calvin Klein perfume bottle or supermodel Christy Turlington.
These creations gained a following, to the point where work posted in the morning would disappear by lunchtime. Even in those early days, KAWS was hot on the resale market.
“When I was doing graffiti,” he once explained, “it meant nothing to me to make paintings if I wasn’t reaching people.”
Instead of seeking entrée to the elite New York art world (which, frankly, wasn’t looking for a street artist anyway), KAWS moved to Japan, where a flourishing youth culture welcomed visionaries like him.
In 1999, he partnered with Bounty Hunter, a Japanese toy and streetwear brand, to release his first toy. Companion — an eight-inch-tall vinyl reimagining of Mickey Mouse, with a skull-and-crossbones head and trademark XX eyes — debuted with a limited run of 500. It sold out quickly.
Companion was the first of more than 130 toy designs, which came to include such characters as Chum, Blitz, Be@rbrick, BFF and Milo, each immediately recognizable as KAWS figures by their XX eyes. Fans have proved insatiable. In 2017, MoMA’s online store announced the availability of a limited supply of KAWS Companion figures; as avid collectors logged on to stake their claim, the website crashed — multiple times.
Companion is the most visible of the KAWS posse, appearing over the past decade in new postures and combinations in monumental KAWS statues and other works. These include Along the Way (2013), an 18-foot-tall wooden sculpture of two Companions leaning on each other for support; Together (2016), two Companions in a friendly embrace, which debuted during an exhibition of KAWS’s work at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, in Texas; and KAWS:HOLIDAY (2018), a 92-foot-long inflatable Companion floating on its back in Seoul’s Seokchon Lake. The sculptures were re-created as toys, blurring the lines between art and commerce.
KAWS’s visual language may be drawn from cartoons, but his work doesn’t necessarily evoke childlike joy.
“My figures are not always reflecting the idealistic cartoon view that I grew up on,” he explains in the catalogue for the Fort Worth exhibition. “Companion is more real in dealing with contemporary human circumstances . . . . I think when I’m making work it also often mirrors what’s going on with me at that time.”
KAWS's résumé reads like a record of major 21st-century pop-culture moments. It includes his work with streetwear brands like A Bathing Ape and Supreme; his design for the cover of Kanye West’s 2008 album, 808s & Heartbreak; and his collaboration with designer Kim Jones on the Dior Homme Spring/Summer 2019 collection, Jones’s debut as the fashion brand’s creative director.
Learn how to spot a fake KAWS art toy, and browse authentic KAWS figures, prints, sculptures and mixed media works on 1stDibs.
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: New York, NY
- Return PolicyThis item cannot be returned.
- KAWS KACHAMUKKU CompanionBy KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYKAWS Kachamukku 2022: KAWS Kachamukku was born out of a unique collaboration between KAWS and the popular children’s Japanese Sesame Street equivalent...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS Holiday Japan: set of 2 works (KAWS Mount Fuji Japan)By KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYKAWS Holiday Companion Japan: Set of 2 works (KAWS Mount Fuji): These sold out KAWS figurines features KAWS' signature character COMPANION in a resting po...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS Pink BFF vinyl (Pink KAWS BFF Companion)By KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYRare KAWS BFF Pink new, unopened in its original packaging. A well-received work and variation of KAWS’ large scale BFF sculpture is in Los Angeles's Playa...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS Along The Way Brown (KAWS brown Along The Way companion)By KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYKAWS Brown Along The Way Companion. New and unopened in its original box. The KAWS Along The Way figurine is a rendition of the artist's 2013 eighteen-foot wood sculpture originally ...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS Japan Holiday Companion (KAWS brown holiday companion)By KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYKAWS Brown Holiday Companion Japan (KAWS Mount Fuji Japan): This sold out KAWS figurative piece features KAWS' signature character COMPANION in a resting position. Published by All Rights Reserved to commemorate the debut of KAWS’ 40-meters-long figure placed amidst the quaint backdrop of Mount Fuji; set up at Fujinomiya’s Camping Ground in Shizuoka. A classic KAWS Companion with a relaxing feel. New in a exclusive hard-shell KAWS designed packaging. Medium: Vinyl Year: 2019 Dimensions: 9.4 inches New/unopened; excellent condition. From a sold out edition of unknown. Acquired directly from publisher. Will look fantastic displayed as a shelf piece or hung in its original packaging. KAWS is a fine artist, illustrator, painter, sculptor, product designer, and toymaker. His cartoonish style—including his best-known characters with X-ed out eyes—has its roots in his early career as a street artist, when he began replacing advertisements with his own, masterful acrylic paintings in the early 1990s. Related Categories Takashi Murakami. Banksy. Damien Hirst. Pop Art. Kaws figurative sculpture. Kaws Passing Through. Kaws Resting Place...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Pop Art Prints and Multiples
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS Black Flayed Companion (KAWS flayed)By KAWSLocated in NEW YORK, NYKAWS Black Flayed Companion 2016. A rare, out of print KAWS figurative sculpture new and sealed in its original packaging. Published by Med...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Prints and Multiples
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - Companion - Brown version- MOMA 2017 - Painted Cast VinylBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXThis is a brand new, in its original packaged, never open. Perfect condition. KAWS's cartoonish style—including his best-known characters with X-ed out eyes—has its roots in his ea...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - FAMILY Figures - Black version - collectible Pop ArtBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXKAWS - FAMILY Figures - Black version New on its original packaging. Medium: Vinyl & Cast ResinCategory
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - BFF - Pink Version _brand newBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXThis is a brand new piece in perfect condition. Several months after releasing the KAWS Share Figure in February, the artist released his long anticipated KAWS Take Figure. The fig...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - Take Figure - Black Version _BFF CompanionBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXThis is a brand new piece in perfect condition. Several months after releasing the KAWS Share Figure in February, the artist released his long anticipated KAWS Take Figure. The fig...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - Clean Slate - Grey Version - brand newBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXKAWS Clean Slate (Grey), new & unopened in its original packaging. Sold Out after the artist's retrospect exhibition at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth Medium: Vinyl & Cast Res...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
- KAWS - Take Figure - Blue Version _BFF CompanionBy KAWSLocated in Dallas, TXThis is a brand new piece in perfect condition. Several months after releasing the KAWS Share Figure in February, the artist released his long anticipated KAWS Take Figure. The fig...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Sculptures
MaterialsResin, Vinyl
Recently Viewed
View AllRead More
How to Spot a Fake KAWS Figure
KAWS art toys have developed an avid audience in recent decades, and as in any robust collectible market, counterfeiters have followed the mania. Of course, you don’t have to worry about that on 1stDibs, where all our sellers are highly vetted.
KAWS Is Having a Major Effect on Popular Culture, Whether on the Street or in Museums
From graffiti tagger to hypebeast obsession to auction hero — we chart the artist’s rise and his widening influence.