Tag Archives: Limited edition

Hellström street art, Record cover art, Street art

Hellstrom – A Swedish Street Artist.

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As a collector of record cover art, I have tried to limit collecting to a manageable number of artists, and the ones I have chosen are those that have produced a collectible number of covers. I once set out to collect Alex Steinweiss covers but gave up after I had found about fifty as there were still about 2,450 still to collect. I similarly decided not to try to collect Anton Corbijn‘s record covers — he’s been responsible for far too many. As I have mentioned on a previous post I did have a nice collection of Vaughan Oliver‘s record cover art but in the end I couldn’t house it all so it had to go.

My collection of record covers by street artists is limited to only three. I have what seems to be an ever expanding collection of covers by the artist who calls himself Banksy and a few choice covers by Robert del Naja (a.k.a. 3D). However, a couple of years ago I had an exhibition of some of my paintings at a gallery in Stockholm and exchanged a couple of works for posters by the Swedish street artist Iron. At the same time I had begun to notice the appearance of paper deer stuck on hoardings surrounding building sites around town. These turned out to be the work of another Swedish street artist by the name of Hellstrom. Like Iron, he prefers to keep his identity secret but he has been interviewed in a recent book Hellstrom Street Art published in 2019.

The book gives a good overview of Hellstrom‘s work to date. One picture in particular, together with the cover image, struck a chord.

Hellstrom shares his name with the popular Swedish singer Håkan Hellström and it is Hellstrom‘s portrait on Hellström on the cover of the book. It transpires that Hellstrom (no dots over the “o”) stencilled this portrait on a limited edition of Håkan Hellström‘s (with the dotted “o”) 2019 album Illusioner in an edtion of 40 copies.

One day last August I popped into my favourite record shop in Stockholm and saw this album hanging on the wall. It was number 36/40 and it accompanied me home to be the sole representative of Hellstrom‘s (minus the dots) art in my record cover collection.

Banksy record covers

Obtaining the unobtainable…

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My friend Tasso von Haussen keeps me up to date on record and CD covers with Banksy connections. He recently sent me pictures of four 12″ releases on the Bow Wow label by Buckfunk 3000 (2 Much Booty, 2004), Product.01 (The Loud EP, 2004), Speed Baby – aka Tim Wright (Taken / Lurcher, 2004) and Bass Kittens (Rise of the Machines, 2005) that all use a modification of Banksy’s Dog with Rocket Launcher design.

Four Bow Wow 12″ covers.


Next he found a test pressing of a split EP by Embalming Theatre / Tersanjung XIII (Mommy Died – Mummified / Hellnoise) on the Rotten to the Core label. The six-track EP was released in 2013 in a limited edition — 100 copies on clear vinyl and 400 on black vinyl.

The cover of the limited edition EP.

However, the test pressing had a different cover.

The cover of the test pressing of the EP.

According to Discogs, there are fifteen copies of the test pressing and, after being in contact with the band, I have to admit that the chances of finding one are probably close to zero. The cover image is, of course, a modification of Banksy’s I Fought the Law print. I was surprised to learn from my discussions with the band that they had no idea this was a Banksy design. I then contacted the band’s record label, Rotten to the Core Records to ask who designed the cover of the test pressing. Here is the reply from Robert Janis, the company’s owner: It’s a Banksy piece. I’m the one who designed the test press cover. He even sent a copy of Banksy’s original artwork.

Banksy’s original I Fought the Law print.

Another friend supplied me with the original image from which Banksy created his print:

The original photo from which Banksy created his I Fought the Law print.

So, in order to keep my Banksy collection as complete as possible, I need to get hold of a copy of this test pressing… The only sure way seems to be to make my own. I asked for scans of the cover and record label and, after a considerable amount of work, this what I came up with.

The result.

I decided to make a limited edition of ten numbered copies, plus five artists proofs. The scan I had to base my design on was somewhat overexposed and I thought there was a thin white border round the greyish outer border. A later, better photo, showed that there was no white border. My first attempt was in pure monochrome, as shown above. However, a more recent, clearer photo, supplied by Tasso von Haussen, shows that the cover has a bluish tinge. I’m not sure how much the plastic protective cover controbutes to the bluishness, though.

I’m still trying to work out how to add the blue overcoat to the black an white image. In order to distinguish my reproductions from the origials, I have made proper sleeves that the record slips in and out of, rater than the single, foled sheet of paper that the real test pessings have.

I decided that it would be fun to use real Embalming Theatre / Tersanjung 13 EPs and give them white labels. So I got back in touch with the band and ordered more copies. Bear in mind that these are a limited edition of 400 black vinyl EPs, so now I own about 2,5 per cent of the edition.