Post No Bills is a gallery that specializes in selling limited-run prints and editions. The company was started by music entrepreneur Jordan Bratman and art dealer Steve Lazarides, in order to make art more accessible to the public. I visited their location in Venice Beach to interview Jordan Bratman, who was overseeing a team putting the final touches on the upcoming Paul Insect exhibit. I got the immediate impression that Jordan believes in Post No Bills 110%. And it shines through when you realize that you can visit one of their awesome opening receptions and walk away with a signed print by mega-artists like Ron English and FAILE for only $20.
Daniel Rolnik: What was the first print you bought as a collector?
Jordan Bratman: Honestly, I can’t remember. Even before we had any money, my brother Josh and I would pool our cash to buy vintage rock posters together. We have a lot of stuff from the Fillmore shows, which is interesting because our master printer here at Post No Bills, Ramon De Larosa, started out by printing all those posters.
DR: What clicked to make you start the Post No Bills?
JB: I feel like so many American art galleries have a really high barrier of entry for the average consumer. And people rarely get to experience the artist’s process – you know, the magic that happens inside the studio. I wanted to open a space that would be extremely comfortable and accessible to everyone. I had been cooking up the idea for a long time with my business partner Steve Lazarides, who’s a big art dealer that I bought a lot of work from over the years. I actually bought a Banksy print from him years ago before everyone caught the fever-at least year in the US.
DR: Is Post No Bills a shop or a gallery?
JB: I guess it’s both, but we use the word shop because we don’t want it to feel like a pretentious gallery. However, it’s up to us to curate inspired work that will hold its value and hopefully increase over time investment-wise. We also make pretty much everything that we sell here in house – we’re finishing the last color on a 17 layer hand pulled Ron English print in the back of the space. It’s really an amazing piece [ View it HERE] at a great price point. We are all really proud of it – it’s a win win for the artists, the consumer and PNB!
DR: So everything in the show was printed here?
JB: Not everything, some of the work is from the artist’s archives. But like I said, a majority of the work are hand made prints made on site.
DR: Do you make digital prints?
JB: We do, but we don’t really like to unless it incorporates some hand-finished elements – We want the focus on more unique works. Fine art printing with low editions and lots of fun personal finishing touches by the artist.
DR: How did you find Post No Bill’s master printer, Ramon?
JB: A lot of research actually – we talked to almost every print master and artist in Los Angeles and I had heard from multiple sources that he was the best guy in LA. Ramon was teaching printmaking somewhere at the time and he jumped at the opportunity because of his many years of experience – from blacklight posters of the ’60s to some of the coolest Shepard Fairey’s fine art prints today. He actually printed all of Banksy’s incredible LA prints, which we put on display in the space a few months back – but that’s not how I found him.
DR: This is only the Post No Bill’s 4th show right?
JB: Paul Insect will be our 5th show and it will actually be our last show in this space.
DR: Why are you moving to a new location?
JB: We need to find more of a balance between our selling space and printing space, since we’re producing a lot more work.
DR: Where are you going to move to?
JB: We’re looking at a bunch of buildings now, but we want to stay on Abbot Kinney in Venice or somewhere close by.
DR: How closely do you work with each artist that shows at Post No Bills?
JB: We fly the artists out here and even rent them a house to stay in for a couple of weeks because they have to make all the prints for their show. It’s part of the experience to get inspired by the space, life on the beach and in the hood.
DR: How many of the pieces in each show do you take home for your personal collection?
JB: I buy a lot – without any discounts – which is one of the problems of being in this business as someone who loves collecting art. Sometimes it’s so hard to let some of the pieces go, especially since I get to see them all first.
DR: Do you choose the artist for each show?
JB: It’s collaboration between Steve Lazarides and myself.
DR: What goes into choosing each artist?
JB: To be honest this is a business and we have to make money, but we really just want to show work that we genuinely love. We wouldn’t show an artist at Post No Bills just because they made a lot of money.
DR: Why do you have group shows?
JB: It usually takes months or years for one artist to make an entire breadth of work, so it takes the pressure off of an artist if they only have to make a couple pieces as opposed to a whole show. We also want to turn people on to as many great artists as possible.
DR: Do you split the sale of each print 50/50 with the artist?
JB: Yes.
DR: How accessible are the prints to people?
JB: It depends on the artist. For our FAILE show we had work priced from $10 all the way up to $14,000. Obviously you can’t consider $14,000 accessible, but it is for an original FAILE – since the piece was a one-off that was hand painted.
DR: Do you sell any originals?
JB: We always like to have at least one original by an artist in the show, just so people can see what an original piece by that artist really looks like. Most of the multiples we sell are hand finished, so technically they are one off’s as well.
DR: How many of the prints are selling online vs. inside the shop?
JB: I don’t know what the split is, but we do really well online. Post No Bills is really a destination and we focus on bringing people here – so there are things in the gallery that we don’t sell online.
DR: Who is the next artist that’s going to be featured in the gallery?
JB: Paul Insect – he’s a big cult artist in London. At his first major solo show in London, Damien Hirst walked in before the opening and literally bought every single piece. He also worked very closely with Banksy for many years as a collaborator. He is a seminal street artist and I really believe in him. We’re offering an opportunity to get in on his work at a reasonable price.
DR: Have you noticed any parallels between the music industry and the art world?
JB: They both involve working with creative people, but are very different. The thing I like about the art world is that, for the most part, the artists tend be more pure – as opposed to a lot musicians I’ve worked with. A lot of the artist who have shown at Post No Bills don’t even want people to know what they look like because they want the work to speak for itself and you don’t get that in the music industry. I come from the pop side of the music business, so obviously a lot of it is about making a commercial product and not every artist is like that.
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POST NO BILLS: http://www.postnobillsshop.com/
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UPCOMING SHOWS
WHEN: November 3rd, 2011
WHERE: POST NO BILLS [1103 Abbot Kinney Boulevard, Venice, CA 90291]
TIME: 7pm-10pm
WHAT: The work of Paul Insect
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Photos by Carlos Gonzalez, Post No Bills, Curated Mag, Hypebeast, and LA Weekly
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2 Responses to Interview with Post No Bills
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Another nice read. Excellent insight into PNB and its crew.
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