While a Hermès Birkin Bag is already a super-expensive gift, Kanye took the one he gifted Kim with on Christmas morning to the next level as it was hand-painted by renowned artist George Condo, worth a reported $1.3 million.
The surrealist nude artwork on the pricey bag raised some eyebrows, a reaction Kanye and Condo knew it would illicit.
“Kanye and I both knew immediately that people who knew our collaboration would think it was fun but that Kim’s fan base would go berserk,” Condo, who had previously designed five different covers for Ye’s 2010 album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, told W Magazine.
So what was the thought process behind the out-of-the-box gift?
“The whole point was to take an icon of consumerism and change it, which is like blasphemy. ‘You can’t do this!’ It short circuits people’s concept of what’s untouchable, which is why it was fun to do. If I had just done it and put it in my closet, it wouldn’t mean a thing,” he said, laughing. “But when you stick that bag in the hands of Kim Kardashian, well, then you create a whole different atmosphere. It’s about context.”
For Kim’s 34th birthday a few years later, Kanye gifted her with another custom Hermès, but this time the original artwork on it was done by an artist they both knew very well: North.