To many of us art and toy collectors Frank Kozik is an icon. The Spanish-born artist has a list of poster designs from some of the most influential musicians in history; from Nirvana, Pearl Jam and the Red Hot Chili Peppers and much more. On the other side, Frank has turned out staples of the art toy genera such as the Labbit, Mongers, Heathrow and my personal favorites are the series of busts. His work of limited run bust art toys will be our focus here today.
The most notable are the bust of Mickey Mao titled “The Bird is the Word.” One that is many colorways flocked (a velvety surface) and even bronze (above), each that stands approximately a foot tall. The largest of them was a few feet in height as pictured. Personally, in my collection resides the very rad green flocked version of “Bird is the Word.”
Frank continued with more excellent bust variants. The Dead Che bust which is of revolutionary Che Guevara with a skull face. The Ludwig Van bust that paid homage to the novel and film A Clockwork Orange. Smokin Joe Stalin who was the leader of the Soviet Union for 30 years. The Ho Chi Minh bust of the Vietnamese dictator is 14” tall and has a removable hat and iconic AK-47. His most recent design is of the Ronald Reagan “The Gipper” bust of the 40th President of the USA. That has a removable “Destroy” sign that covers the eyes and an iconic anarchy logo on the lapel.
Kozik even did a smaller version of busts called the Goon Squad. They featured the likenesses of Lil Ilych, The Gipper, The Pyong Yang Player, The Havana Slammer and DJ Aya-Hollah are each 4 inches tall. Which are of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, Ronald Reagan, Kim Jong Il, Fidel Castro, and Ayatollah Khomeini each looking like frat boys blind-boxed in CMYK colorways.
The bust of Elvis Presley titled “The King is Dead” that was originally released in bronze for Lulubell Toys and was last seen as a prototype at the DKE booth of SDCC in 2012. This is one Kozik bust that we may sadly may never see in any other version aside from solid bronze.
Another artist pulled a twist on the Kozik bust series titled Dead Kozik by Kevin Gosselin. Originally this one off piece was done for a gallery showing and then turned into a successful Kickstarter campaign with various colorway runs. As a contributor to the Kickstarter campaign, I asked Kevin to do a version of Dead Kozik Bust that included pop out eyes similar to Rat Fink and painted up. From the photos, you can see that he nailed it.
Frank Kozik now is the creative director for Kidrobot in Boulder, CO and continues to release kick ass work under the Kidrobot brand. As for acquiring some of these aforementioned busts, well I wish you happy hunting. Some are still available in certain colorways from online stores and some you will only be able to find on sites such as eBay. Happy hunting.