Recent arts coverage
Follow @artsinaustin on Twitter
Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2009 > March > 14 > Entry
UT commissions a mural from Shepard Fairey, Obama “Hope” poster artist
Shepard Fairey, the street artist best known for his now-iconic “Hope” campaign poster of Barack Obama, has been commissioned by the University of Texas at Austin’s Landmarks public art program to create a mural on the exterior of the Art Building at the corner of 23rd Street and San Jacinto Boulevard.
The artist’s team will install Fairey’s original composition beginning at 2 p.m. Thursday. The public is invited to show up and watch the mural be installed. Likely it will one Fairey’s signature multi-layered images that feature counter-culture heroes in a retro-like propaganda style.
The Los Angeles-based Fairey won’t commit, however, to be at UT himself to the see mural go up. Although his Obama poster now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., Fairey currently faces multiple vandalism charges in Boston for pasting his work on public and private property. Also, the Associated Press has recently accused Fairey of unfair appropriation of their copyrighted photograph for the “Hope” poster.
Still, it’s widely rumored that Fairey will be in Austin during SXSW. And if he is in town, he’s likely to be postering around town. Fairey’s can also be seen here next week in the exhibit “New Brow: The Rise of Underground Art.”
Born in 1970, Fairey received his bachelor of arts degree from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1992. While still in art school the skateboard-obsessed Fairey started making defiant images on stickers that he plastered in public spaces.
One of his earliest street campaigns was the “Obey Giant,” referencing Andre the Giant, the professional wrestler. The simple black and white image with “obey” across the bottom soon appeared in cities across the country on posters and stickers.
“The sticker has no meaning but exists only to cause people to react, to contemplate and search for meaning in the sticker,” reads the Obey campaign manifesto. “Because OBEY has no actual meaning, the various reactions and interpretations of those who view it reflect their personality and the nature of their sensibilities.”
The Obey Giant campaign still continues.
And despite his own run-ins with copyright infringement, last year Fairey had his attorneys send a cease-and-desist order to Austin graphic artist Baxter Orr who did his own take on Fairey’s work, creating an image called Protect, with the iconic Obey Giant face covered by a respiratory mask.
Fairey’s work is included in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego.
The artist’s first museum survey, “Shepard Fairey: Supply & Demand,” is currently on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. To complement this exhibition, he installed an ephemeral mural for Tufts University Art Gallery, Boston.
Comments
Click here to report comment abuse.
By Not a laughing matter
March 20, 2009 9:57 AM | Link to this
Is anyone really surprised?
I am sure UT is working out a deal with Thomas Kinkade right not for the mural, which is any not different than their decision to scrap the Herzog & deMeuron design for the Blanton and feed us one of the ugliest and functionally inappropriate new buildings on campus.
By Katie
March 19, 2009 6:30 AM | Link to this
Criminal? Why? Advertising is on bill boards across the country, on fliers stapled to walls and telephone poles, on your radio, t.v., in your head. What Fairey is doing is the exact same, only he’s advertising something more difficult to understand and more valuable to the viewer: questions. And what is a wall if not for utilizing it for all its potential. Shame on prehistoric man for ruining perfectly good rocks? Fairey does not make ugly or crude work. I find it sad that our society decided long ago that proof of its own existence (graffitti, street art, protest, VOICE) has become something illegal and degenerate. He’s doing something that takes courage, skill, and an opinion. Contribute as much to society and then criticize the work of others. He has done more to influence history than many ever will.
By Jane
March 15, 2009 2:44 PM | Link to this
Just like UT to hire a criminal. Disgusting. Shame on you UT>
By jn
March 15, 2009 1:51 PM | Link to this
This is too funny � is UT going to make Fairey submit the first draft to the plagiarism prevention website for students www.TurnItIn.com?? Ha!
By katlyn
March 15, 2009 12:42 PM | Link to this
1 art is never a waste of money. It prepetuates creativity. It makes people think, outside of normal everyday munade things, and keeps people inspired to create themselvs. 2 Fairey is a male. 3 as far as Fairey being sued by AP, it is a ridiculous lawsuit. Because it is totally unbelivable that they hold the patent on Obama looking into the distance with his head held up and to the right.By Stephen
March 15, 2009 12:10 PM | Link to this
What a complete waste of university funds
By Willie
March 15, 2009 11:53 AM | Link to this
Why do this? The form Soviet Union has some old out-dated pics of Stalin and Lenin would fit the bill.
By everett
March 15, 2009 9:44 AM | Link to this
I’m really glad he didn’t copy write his poster because I really like my Tee-Shirt with Ronald Reagan’s picture emblazoned on it with the words “RIGHT” underneath it and in the same motif as Mr. Fairy’s poster. Of course that would be the point.
By Fred Cantu
March 15, 2009 9:22 AM | Link to this
Let’s hope Fairey’s work for UT is all original material. She was sued by the Associated Press for using one of their copyrighted Obama snapshots as the basis for her Hope piece.