Laugh Now
Laugh Now
Signed Print
Banksy
£60,000-£100,000Value
Indicator
$110,000-$190,000 Value Indicator
$100,000-$170,000 Value Indicator
¥540,000-¥900,000 Value Indicator
€70,000-€120,000 Value Indicator
$590,000-$990,000 Value Indicator
¥11,150,000-¥18,590,000 Value Indicator
$80,000-$130,000 Value Indicator
This estimate blends recent public auction records with our own private sale data and network demand.
There aren’t enough data points on this work for a comprehensive result. Please speak to a specialist by making an enquiry.
Medium: Screenprint
Format: Signed Print
Year: 2003
Size: H 70cm x W 50cm
Edition size: 150
Signed: Yes
TradingFloor
MyPortfolio
Your colletion tracked in realtime.
Build your portfolio, manage valuations, view return against your collection and watch works you're looking for.
Track auction value trend
Banksy's "Laugh Now", a signed screen print from 2003, is a highly sought-after piece with an estimated value between £60,000 and £100,000. Over the past 12 months, the average selling price was £55,650, with a total sales volume of three pieces. In the last five years, the hammer price has varied from a low of £35,000 in January 2019 to a high of £120,960 in March 2021. Since its first sale in April 2008, "Laugh Now" has been sold 22 times in countries including the United Kingdom, Japan, and Ireland. The piece has demonstrated a robust average annual growth rate of 21%, with sellers seeing an average return of £63,938. This limited edition artwork is part of a small series of just 150 prints.
Auction Results
| Auction Date | Auction House | Artwork | Hammer Price | Return to Seller | Buyer Paid |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 2023 | Sotheby's London - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| August 2023 | Forum Auctions London - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| April 2023 | Sotheby's London - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| August 2022 | Sotheby's Online - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| September 2021 | Christie's London - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| September 2021 | Sotheby's Online - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print | |||
| June 2021 | Bonhams New Bond Street - United Kingdom | Laugh Now - Signed Print |
Meaning & Analysis
Laugh Now is a Banksy screen print from 2003, released in a signed edition of 150. Featuring a monkey wearing a sandwich board that reads "Laugh Now But One Day We'll Be In Charge". The original artwork first appeared in a Brighton nightclub.
‘Laugh now, but one day we’ll be in charge’, reads the sandwich board worn by the eerie monkey in this 2003 Banksy signed print. Much like with Banksy’s visual vocabulary in general, there can be various interpretations for the monkey figure in this work. It can be viewed as a representation of the oppressed, who walk the streets until they’re exhausted in order to spread their message. Or perhaps it is simply a monkey, by which Banksy is commenting on how man has enslaved animals for centuries, including his primate cousins, much like he does in the work Barcode with a leopard, or it could be a symbol for the common man, the average Joe who is downtrodden by class wars and enslaved by capitalism, themes that Banksy regularly revisits through different characters such as a rat in other famous prints like Love Rat and Gangsta Rat.
Laugh Now was a commission before being released as a print, it appeared in a nightclub in Brighton and eventually went on to be sold for almost half a million dollars.
The Banksy Private Sale Experts
Sell to the largest Banksy collector network in the world, at a guaranteed 0% seller's fee.