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NOTOFILIA Numismatics and Notaphily
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United States · Pop art · Rency

Life Is Beautiful / LIFE SPRAY · 5/200

One object: a pop-art face on a genuine $1 with eight LIFE SPRAY cans, serial F 71235101 A, and the back of a $2 (Declaration of Independence), manuscript edition 5/200.

Catalog facts

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Rency · 5/200
Serial number
F71235101A
Signatures
Manuscript RENCY / 5/200 (back); vertical Rency at right on the face. The Treasury signatures sit under the overlay
Condition
Unslabbed (private collection)
Printage
Federal Reserve paper (BEP) with a Rency intervention. Manuscript edition 5/200 on the back. This record does not invent a BEP printage for the type, and it does not treat 5/200 as a population census.

Face

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Pop-art face on a genuine $1, serial F 71235101 A: eight LIFE SPRAY cans, neon “life is beautiful,” and vertical Rency.

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Pop-art face on a genuine $1, serial F 71235101 A: eight LIFE SPRAY cans, neon “life is beautiful,” and vertical Rency.
Pop-art face on a genuine $1, serial F 71235101 A: eight LIFE SPRAY cans, neon “life is beautiful,” and vertical Rency.

Back

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Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), with manuscript RENCY and edition 5/200.

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Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), with manuscript RENCY and edition 5/200.
Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), with manuscript RENCY and edition 5/200.

The note

The face starts from a $1 Federal Reserve Note: green serials F 71235101 A on a legal-tender engraved ground. Over that paper Rency lines up eight spray cans — caps in green, orange, red, purple, blue, black, yellow, and grey — each with cursive “Rency,” a “FEDERAL BANK OF RENCY” seal with an R, the legends “LIFE” and “SPRAY,” a row of hearts, and dripping paint. Across the cans, “life is beautiful” in yellow-orange neon, with hearts on the i-dots. At right, vertical Rency. The back is not the $1 Great Seal: it is the FRN $2 reverse, Trumbull’s Declaration of Independence, and, in black marker, “RENCY” and “5/200.” It is one collectible — face and back of the same object — not two separately catalogued notes, and not a Treasury or BEP issue. Printed serial F71235101A also appears on Pelé / The Beautiful Game (another $1/$2 hybrid, edition 5/200, with Pelé portraits), on Messi / You Have to Fight to Reach Your Dream (a Messi hybrid, edition 2/222), and on Warhol & Basquiat / Life Is Beautiful (a $2 on both faces, with no edition fraction); they are distinct physical objects.

The artist

Rency is the public name of this artist; on the paper the signature is often RENCY in capitals. The artist is an anonymous United States pop and street artist who works on genuine notes. Dealer copy that likens the work to Banksy is a sales line, not an attribution or a verified biography. This is not Rency Punnoose. The subject is the spray can as a house brand: “LIFE SPRAY,” the “FEDERAL BANK OF RENCY” seal, and the neon legend “life is beautiful.” It does not duplicate Warhol & Basquiat / Life Is Beautiful, which uses the same phrase over portraits of Warhol and Basquiat. This record describes the physical object; it does not value the edition or republish auction prices.

Scarcity and printage

The artist numbered this piece 5/200. That fraction is an edition statement on the paper, not a PMG or PCGS census and not a BEP printage. This record does not publish an independent count of surviving examples. The eight LIFE SPRAY cans set the object apart from the Pelé / The Beautiful Game hybrid, also 5/200 with the same printed serial, from Messi / You Have to Fight to Reach Your Dream, edition 2/222, and from Warhol & Basquiat / Life Is Beautiful, the $2 intervened on both faces, with no edition fraction.

Population

A PMG or PCGS census for this object has not been independently verified. Printed serial F71235101A matches Pelé / The Beautiful Game, Messi / You Have to Fight to Reach Your Dream, and Warhol & Basquiat / Life Is Beautiful; the match is recorded and does not merge the records. The note is shown unslabbed.

Sources

← Rency