Shepard Fairy helps get our new president elected, is the recipient of a personal letter of thanks from Obama, and on the eve of his first solo show at the Institute of Contemporary Art THIS is how the Boston authorities treat him.
The timing of AP's action against Shepard Fairy also smacks of money (and perhaps politically?) motivated sour grapes. I mean if it was really about credit, they'd have taken action before the election, when posters could have been amended to include the photographer's name. Shepard's always been more than honest about the fact that he based his iconic image on an AP photograph he found via Google. Also, as Fairy told me in an interview for SG, he never kept any of the money made from sales of the Obama images he channeled all of it back into creating more stickers and posters for the campaign.
I hope in the long term such controversy will only add to Shepard's legend (and the price of his art) but still, this is a pretty shitty way to treat a national treasure.
The timing of AP's action against Shepard Fairy also smacks of money (and perhaps politically?) motivated sour grapes. I mean if it was really about credit, they'd have taken action before the election, when posters could have been amended to include the photographer's name. Shepard's always been more than honest about the fact that he based his iconic image on an AP photograph he found via Google. Also, as Fairy told me in an interview for SG, he never kept any of the money made from sales of the Obama images he channeled all of it back into creating more stickers and posters for the campaign.
I hope in the long term such controversy will only add to Shepard's legend (and the price of his art) but still, this is a pretty shitty way to treat a national treasure.
And arresting the guy? How thoroughly productive. He was a utter menace to society.