Discover contemporary urban prints for sale. Our range of urban street art prints by emerging artists has been carefully selected by our curatorial team for you to rent or buy.
You can start by exploring our selection of pop art urban prints, featuring iconic cultural references and humours compositions.
For something a little different, our unique collection of abstract urban prints combine a graffiti, urban aesthetic with 20th century strategies of distortion.
The History of Urban Prints
Urban art prints have their roots in the graffiti and street art movements of the 1960s and 1970s in cities like New York. As graffiti transitioned from brick walls to gallery spaces, artists began creating prints to bring the bold, rebellious aesthetic of urban art to a wider audience. This shift allowed artists to blend the raw energy of street culture with more formal artistic methods such as screen printing.
A key figure in this transition was Jean-Michel Basquiat, who started as a graffiti artist under the tag ‘SAMO’, before moving into fine art. His expressive style, incorporating graffiti elements, has been translated into prints that retain his distinctive energy and vivid compositions. You can find out more about Basquiat in our Guide to 10 of his major works.
Keith Haring was another New York-based artist who brought street art to the mainstream. His playful yet powerful pieces combine street art energy with evocative social commentary – his most well-known works centring on HIV activism. You can explore some exceptional Haring prints on Rise Art, including a one-of-a-kind cartoon of Andy Warhol, Andy Mouse (1988).
Moving into the present day, Shepard Fairey is known for his ‘Obey Giant’ campaign, which has elevated urban art prints into a global commercial phenomenon. Banksy, the elusive British artist, has also contributed to the popularity of urban art, translating his politically charged street art into limited edition prints.
Urban Prints for Sale on Rise Art
The work of Claude de Luca oscillates between urban and pop art, figurative and abstract styles. Rich layered artworks like Effervescence (2016) combine acrylic, collage, and pencil to create abstract cityscapes with an urban feel. Lines and shapes imitate the outlines of buildings, while stripes of white carefully capture the effect of light in the city.
For a more traditional urban art style, Piers Bourke combines progressive print-making techniques with traditional urban subject matter. Bourke is well known for his iconic depictions of quintessential British objects such as telephone boxes. Influenced by travelling through Asia, artworks like Japanese Vending Machine (2022) combine photography and graffiti to create vibrant and evocative compositions.
Our collection of modern urban landscape prints for collectors showcases the work of Andy Mercer, who creates atmospheric cityscapes using urban textures and imagery such as graffiti, street signs and torn posters. Just Another Rainy Day In The North (2010) depicts an industrial town as viewed from the inside of a building, creating an atmospheric patchwork of city life.
Explore more emerging artists and buy urban art prints online on Rise Art.
