Shepard “OBEY GIANT” Fairey
Shepard Fairey is the man behind OBEY GIANT, the graphics that have changed the way people see art within the urban landscape. What started with an absurd sticker he created in 1989 while studying at the Rhode Island School of Design has since evolved into a worldwide street art campaign, as well as an acclaimed body of fine art.
The OBEY GIANT campaign is rooted in the DIY counterculture of punk rock and skateboarding, but it has also taken cues from popular culture, commercial marketing and political messaging. Fairey steeps his ideology and iconography in the self-empowerment of those who refuse to be manipulated by the machine of manufactured consent.
Fairey’s work reached a new height of prominence in 2008, when his “HOPE” portrait of Barack Obama became the iconic image of the presidential campaign and helped inspire an unprecedented political movement. The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston recently honoured him with a full-scale solo retrospective.
facade