Shepard Fairey: Cultural vanguard or plagiarist?
Wednesday, February 18th, 2009When Shepard Fairey appeared on the Colbert Report Jan. 15, I honestly didn’t think very much of it. Of course, that episode aired before the recent Obama poster controversy. Fairey’s interview only lasted four minutes while he sat in his chair and gave a nonchalant and bare-bones outline of his work on the Obey Campaign and the once famous, but now infamous “Hope” poster. For me, it all sounded like well-traveled terrain.
I did, however, learn two things from that interview: The man has bad posture, and he likes to smirk when he speaks of “being a criminal.” But now that he’s in trouble, what does our faithful counter-culturalist do? He turns to the courts — that is, to the Law with a capital L. Fairey’s preemptive civil action, and the very real step towards officialdom it implies, just doesn’t seem too “punk rock.”
Last Thursday’s Colbert returned to the discussion of Fairey (see video above). Colbert’s attorney Ed Colbert (his brother) debates with the former head of the Whitney Museum, David Ross. The two sides argue the Obama poster’s implications, albeit in a mostly staged, comedic litigation.
