From the Artist Who Brought You "Obama HOPE"

I'm glad that Randy Kennedy of The New York Times alerted me to the Shepard Fairey exhibit that opened in early February in Boston's very handsome Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA). It's always good to have another reason to return to this beautifully situated and architecturally satisfying building on Fort Point facing Boston Harbor.

Fairey is a Charleston-born, RISD-trained street artist. I remember my first (unwitting) exposure to his art, when I saw his Andre the Giant stickers plastered on tollbooths on the New Jersey Turnpike in the early Nineties. As he put it, "the sticker has no meaning but exists only to cause people to react, to contemplate and search for meaning in the sticker." He succeeded. I remember thinking at the time, "What the...?"

In the past year, we've all come to know his art. The centerpiece of his ICA exhibit is a beautiful mixed media rendition of his "Obama HOPE" poster, which I first saw outside the National Constitution Center when Obama and Hillary Clinton came to Philadelphia for a presidential primary debate last spring. In a little over a year, that depiction of Obama has achieved iconic status, and a rendition now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in D.C.

Fairey has been cranking out his version of "propaganda" for about 20 years. His work is inspired chiefly by Russian Constructivists and Latin American Social Realists of the '20s and '30s. He borrows liberally -- images of dictators real and imagined, the graphic styles of Warhol and the Haight, the textures of wheat-paste posters and flocked Victorian wallpaper can all be seen in his work... not to mention photos of Obama "liberated" from AP. He's had success as a printmaker, a designer of skateboard art, and an illustrator of CDs and record albums.

His work often mocks advertising and American symbols by giving them ironic treatments or substituting his own "meaningless" symbols to challenge our perceptions. His pieces are bold, jarring, amusing, annoying. The exhibit is extensive, proceeding across a half-dozen themed exhibit rooms ("Portraiture," "Music," "Propaganda," "Question Everything," etc.). I particularly appreciated his observations on music, which is a major influence on his life and art: "music is a lot cooler (than art) and way more able to reach people's hearts and minds." Agreed -- but his work at the ICA can also reach deeply, and is well worth spending a couple of hours with.

Given his propensity for borrowing from others, I was amused in flipping through the exhibit catalog at the several hundred "bootlegs" he has collected, where his Andre stickers have been adapted to salute Ralph Nader and Don King, among others. And I also realized that I've bought some of his work before -- I think. A couple of holidays ago, I bought some "Obey the Greyhound" paraphernalia for my wife, done in that same Constructivist style. Still not sure if it's his or someone paying homage to his style.

Not many street artists make it to the museum. The ICA exhibit is Fairey's first curated museum exhibit. It's worth the trip to Boston.