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Photo du Jour 501
By Tiffany Maleshefski
Artist Shepard Fairey was clearly trying to do a good thing when he donated oodles of his highly coveted Pop Art political propaganda to the Barack Obama campaign.
You know the posters. The ones where the presidential candidate is looking out into America’s horizon brimming with dreamy optimism, with the words "Hope," "Change," "Progress," emblazoned underneath. The ones that sort of imply he’s a Messiah, but kind of have a sense of humor about it too (so back off Republicans!)
Fairey's intent has always been to distribute the iconic image and subsequent posters for free. He even has the image available on his website that folks can download for free. Thousands upon thousands of posters and postcards have been printed, and Fairey, hasn’t made a single dime. And that’s fine, because the “Obey Giant” artist never meant to make a profit.
Totally nice, right?
Ok, well, not so nice is the disappointingly large number of people have begun selling the artist’s free posters on eBay, hoping in most cases, to come away with a whopping $12 or $13.
At a recent Obama fundraiser, volunteers grimaced as they folded the super popular posters in half. They were hoping the crease through the poster’s middle would detract lame asses from reselling the would-or-would-not-be collector’s item on eBay. Good luck with that.
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I was in Portland earlier this week for business, and I noticed that one of their weekly free rags had a similar graphic of Sarah Palin except at the bottom, instead of saying "HOPE," it said "NOPE" :)
Its not right, but this seems inevitable...its a great design & history is being made.
Sorry, I can't get worked up over this one. If one of these posters were, for example, on the wall behind Obama when he made a speech, itw oudl gain a certain value taht could be monetized.
Or another way of looking at it is since the posters are still available for free, only suckers are shelling out. And what's wrong with that? We're not talking about selling food or shelter here.
The crease will begin to be valued as a sign of authenticity.
Pictures of Obama with his mouth closed are considered collectibles.
Next print run for those large Obey posters one sees around, diligently being posted by Fairey's little art school drop-out acolytes - not the ones he actually signes and sells in fancy galleries for big bucks to the hipster set - Fairey can up the irony ante by titling them "ebay" instead of "Obey". Too much irony?
Shepard Fairey has got gimmick and a shtick much like Jeff Koons has one. In post-postmodernist art merit doesn't count for much, shtick does.