Ever wondered why Dennis Hopper possessed little to no quality control over the majority of films he made in the latter part of his career. Turns out the former Easy Rider had a very expense hobby – namely, collecting contemporary pieces of artwork.

Now the BBC are reporting that Hopper’s collection (made up of more than 200 pieces of work) is expected to fetch around £8.3m when they are sold at Christie’s auction house in New York in January next year.

His collection is mainly from US artists, many of which were from the early eighties period in New York, including the likes of Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat (whose film biopic actually featured Hooper in a small role).

A 1971 portrait of Hopper himself by Andy Warhol is another in the collection and that alone is expected to fetch up to £770,000.

Hopper’s roles in awful films like The Super Mario Brothers makes complete sense now!