in 2016, what might be called an interstitial zone of the hypermeme era, "rare pepes" were first plopped onto a platform built on top of the bitcoin chain called counterparty, eventually generating 1,774 cards between sept. 2016 and feb. 2018. somewhere near the end there, "fake rares" emerged as a means to do "hoodrat shit with your friends," which it remains.

in sept. 2021, five years after the issuance of RAREPEPE, the pepe pawn shop launched and began commissioning and curating a new collection of fake rares, some 350+ currently. also lately, pepe's creator, matt furie, has been releasing his own (unassociated) rare pepe cards, each a delightful animated short.

pepe art -- all the rares, fakes, commons, danks, pegz, homers, purples, blank-kamotos, nardo grails, daily smols and smowls and drunken telegram auctions -- is an interconnected and random web of both external and internal references. a of tower of babel of memes. totally unknowable. forever enjoyable.