Unlikely Words » shepard fairey

Shepard Fairey’s Michael Jordan Print

aaron cohen — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:52:45 +0000

Not sure how I missed it, but Michael Jordan is getting inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame tomorrow. Not sure how I missed this either, but it seems Shepard Fairey has been commissioned by Upperdeck to make 3 prints, some of which will be signed by MJ. Not sure if any of the previous sentence is true, but what is true? The below poster is sick, and will, dare I say it, rival Jordan's rookie card for ebayjordanparaphernaliavalue. Yikes. Incidentally, and not completely unrelated, my brother and I each have an unrated Jordan rookie card. Neither of us know where they came from, though, as neither of us ever collected basketball cards.

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Somerville Shepard Fairey Mural Defaced, Repaired

aaron cohen — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 16:11:25 +0000

I can't believe it took me 2 months to get to this, but I'm kind of glad it did because of the happy ending. At the beginning of April, Union Square's Grand came in to find their Shepard Fairey mural defaced and if you look at the pictures, not even in a creative way. Fairey had put up the mural and others like it all over Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, etc this winter in advance of his show at the ICA. While some of these murals, like the one on Grand, were officially approved, some were not, resulting in a legal storm with charges being added as quickly as they were dismissed. The police are so interested in adding additional charges, they recently came in to Grand to ask if the mural had been approved.
All this to say, that in the meantime, Fairey sent a local friend some replacement posters and the mural at Grand has been restored to it's original design. This makes me happy.

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Shepard Fairey Talk At The Institute Of Contemporary Art (ICA) – 2/6/09

aaron cohen — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 05:46:29 +0000

I've been posting a bunch about Shepard Fairey lately because of his show at Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art which is opening this week.

Tonight I got the chance to hear him speak in the auditorium at the ICA. The event was a conversation with Susan Dackerman, a curator at Harvard, and was something of a free form interview.
Images and more after the jump.
There was a lot to like. Fairey was enthusiastic and genuinely seemed to enjoy talking about his art. He didn't come off as pretentious or idealistic, which is always a possibility with celebrities famous for their political activism. At one point, Fairey began quoting, from memory, the entire letter written to him by Obama during the campaign. It would be weird to memorize a letter with the sole purpose of telling it to other people, but the way he said it made it seem like he memorized it for himself. Fairey is clearly excited about Obama (pointing out today's decision to cap the pay of executives of bailed out firms, some of whom could have been in attendance) and was clearly excited to have had a role in electing him.

I liked some of the questions from Dackerman, such as the difference between street art and gallery art, how did you get your start, and talk about 'Obey' and its installation on corporate billboards. However, what I really wanted to hear Fairey talk about was the recent AP claim of copyright on the iconic Obama 'Hope' poster (a presidential portrait that Dackerman pointed out was one of the most famous presidential portraits ever, 2nd only to the portrait of George Washington that, you know, is on our money). Fairey mentioned his critics only one time, saying something like, "People say I appropriate or plagiarize", but then moved on and I was disappointed Dackerman didn't press him on it.

I actually think Fairey would have defended himself well and should have taken the opportunity in front of a favorable audience to make a statement about it. I don't want to talk about 'art' and what makes art because I don't know (or frankly, care) enough about it to defend or indict Fairey on issues of originality. I will say that I remember where I saw my first "Andre the Giant has a Posse" sticker 18 years ago (on the pay phone at Roche Bros on Linden St) and it captured my imagination then and did again 4 years later in on the top of the Olympic Tower in Munich, Germany.

We did a quick turn around the exhibit after the discussion and it's 100% worth seeing if you're a fan of contemporary art. The exhibit is made up of 7 parts, and now I can't remember what they were. The Portraits were cool, the 2nd or 3rd room was cool, but the last room was breathtaking. 3 walls with giant wall-size murals and the 4th wall with over 100 of Fairey's posters. It was astounding and makes the exhibit worth it by itself. What did you think?

There's a bunch of other Fairey news out there, but here's the only other review of the talk I could find - from the Bostonist. Much more blown out than mine, and more paraphrases of quotes, too.

Fairey mentioned several times the "indoor/outdoor" aspect of this exhibit and here's a map by Hargo of all the outdoor installations.

View Larger Map

(Images from OBEY Giant Print Archive. Left: "The Power of Presentation". Fairey said at the talk, "Most people think that's Che Guevara, but it's actually a dude from a '70s haircut book".
Center: This was my favorite poster of the night because I love Ice-T.
Right: If I didn't love Ice-T, this would have been my favorite picture of the night.)

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Shepard Fairey Is All Over My (Internet) TV

aaron cohen — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:44:20 +0000

What do you need cable for anymore when you can get programs about stuff you want to see so easily on the internet? Sports. That's what. (I was just looking to see if the Superbowl is being streamed this year, but couldn't find any reliable results.)

Also, you know what? I don't care that the Shepard Fairey backlash is in full swing, I'm still going to the Supply & Demand show at the ICA, and you should to. Let me know how much of a hack or farce or fake or fraud or rip off he is in the comments, I'll be at the museum.

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Obey Boston – Shepard Fairey at the ICA

aaron cohen — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:43:05 +0000

(Edited to add: here's a review I did of the talk and the exhibit.)

Shepard Fairey is going to be at the ICA in Boston for his first solo museum exhibition from February to August, 2009. To celebrate, he was in Boston today laying some groundwork including the below at Grand in Union Square, Somerville. Right around the corner. I'm going to go check it out when I take out the garbage. Right now.

Day Time by Hargo.

Night Time by me.

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