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NOTOFILIA Numismatics and Notaphily
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United States · Pop art · Rency

Pelé / The Beautiful Game · 5/200

One object: a pop-art face on a genuine $1, 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
Mary Ellen Withrow (Treasurer, $1 face); manuscript RENCY / Rency 5/200 (artist)
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: Pelé portraits, “the beautiful game,” “LOVE WHAT YOU ARE DOING,” and vertical RENCY.

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Pop-art face on a genuine $1, serial F 71235101 A: Pelé portraits, “the beautiful game,” “LOVE WHAT YOU ARE DOING,” and vertical RENCY.
Pop-art face on a genuine $1, serial F 71235101 A: Pelé portraits, “the beautiful game,” “LOVE WHAT YOU ARE DOING,” and vertical RENCY.

Back

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Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), plate 52, with manuscript Rency and edition 5/200.

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Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), plate 52, with manuscript Rency and edition 5/200.
Back of an FRN $2 (Declaration of Independence), plate 52, with manuscript Rency and edition 5/200.

The note

The face starts from a $1 Federal Reserve Note: green serials F 71235101 A, the Treasury seal, and the signature of Mary Ellen Withrow, Treasurer of the United States from 1994 to 2001. Over that engraving Rency overlays portraits of Pelé — young in the Brazil jersey, the bicycle-kick silhouette, the celebrating pose — Pelé’s signature, the legends “the beautiful game” and “LOVE WHAT YOU ARE DOING,” paint splatters, and, vertically at right, RENCY. The back is not the $1 Great Seal: it is the FRN $2 reverse, Trumbull’s Declaration of Independence, plate 52, and, in 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.

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. Pelé (Edson Arantes do Nascimento, 1940–2022) is the subject: “the beautiful game” names football; the bicycle kick and the Brazil jersey are the visual clichés of his career. 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 $1 / $2 hybrid with Pelé portraits sets the object apart from Messi / You Have to Fight to Reach Your Dream, edition 2/222, from Life Is Beautiful / LIFE SPRAY, another $1/$2 hybrid also numbered 5/200, and from Warhol & Basquiat / Life Is Beautiful, the $2 intervened on both faces; all four show printed serial F71235101A.

Population

A PMG or PCGS census for serial F71235101A or for edition 5/200 has not been independently verified. The note is shown unslabbed.

Sources

← Rency