examinations and conclusions for sale?

A local art gallery is featuring works of propaganda art by "urban artist" Shepard Fairey. Long considered a champion of an anarchic, neo-Dadaist street art subtly calculated to ridicule conventional propaganda (whether of the commercial or political variety), Fairey has now decided to take a political turn which many would consider crass, but which is bringing him commercial success. His current show is titled "Manufacturing Dissent":

The term “Manufacturing Dissent” is a derivation of “the manufacturing of consent,” a phrase coined by Walter Lippmann to describe the propaganda engineering that he helped devise in order to drum up public support for World War I. Shepard Fairey designed his politically-charged pieces to counteract the hawkish manipulations of right-wing spin doctors with biting sarcasm and thought-provoking paradoxy. He juxtaposes symbols of combat with feminine imagery to expound upon his concept of powerful pacifism, the idea that force should be used as a means of protection rather than aggression. The explicit messages are a departure from Fairey’s deliberately ambiguous style. Rather than calling on people to question their surroundings, he asks them to fortify their values. While politicians and public relations gurus aim to skew reality into a more satisfying tune, Fairey strikes a dissonant chord, unusually lovely in its honesty.
For those whose "values" are in need of fortification, here's his unusually lovely poster of Angela Davis:

AngelaPeace.jpg

According to the Inquirer, he's sensitve to accusations that he's selling out to "the system":

Despite Fairey's efforts to maintain street-artist credibility, detractors have questioned his social-science maverick sensibilities because of his participation in the commercialism he has seemed at odds with.

His ad agency has done work with a number of companies, including Levis, Sunkist, Express and Sprite (remember "Obey your thirst?"). His Web site, www.obeygiant.com, sells T-shirts, posters, books, CDs and more, including prints of images from his music-and-image box-set collaboration with DJ Shadow, Public Works.

"When I do a corporate job, no one is expecting me to kiss corporate ass; they want me to do it the way I want to do it. I then take the money from that and put it back into my gallery, my magazine [Swindle], and my street art," Fairey explains. "It's super-important for me to show that you can succeed in the system without being absorbed by it."

The key, I think, would be to avoid the leftie communitarian impulse and remain true to his artistic principle of self-absorption.

I mean, what else would compel an artist to engage in what he calls mass bombing -- "slang for spreading a piece of artwork on as many places as possible and in full view of the public"? I think that when something evolves from being free to costing over a hundred dollars for a print, that means that "the system" has reared its ugly head, and contaminated him. At least when it was free, no one had to pay for it. (Actually, people couldn't avoid seeing it -- which might mean that its cost was less than "free" in the usual sense.)

Over the years, the evolution in Fairey's art from hypnotic and subtle chaos towards in-your-face leftist politics (his art now glorifies not only Angela Davis, but Mao and Chomsky) seems to have coincided with -- possibly helped bring about -- his current media successes. (Although in fairness to him, it may be that corporate success forces him into leftist rebellion, leading cyclically to more corporate success -- because after all leftist rebellion is "cool"!)

He admits to a conflict between his stated philosophy and things that need addressing:

....a couple of pieces will offer much more overt views on events, including the war in Iraq.

"I am usually a live-and-let-live type of person, as long as your examinations and conclusions are your own. I just think right now there are a lot of things going on that need to be addressed," he says. "While I am torn between those two sides of me, I have decided to toss my hat in the ring and participate."

While I'm not fond of the "bombing" approach to art, I think he'd do better to stick to his original philosophy of live-and-let-live, coupled with satire. Otherwise he might succumb to the disease of taking himself seriously -- a deadly form of intellectual stultification which could cause him to start believing his political propaganda. While that might translate into commercial success in a world of socialist corporate Big Brotherism (which loves faux rebellion), his "examinations and conclusions" won't remain his own. At least not for long.

While I have generally low and flexible standards, I do think there's more than one way to sell out. Some things shouldn't be for sale.

(But I suppose that's something that isn't for me -- an admitted sellout -- to say....)

posted by Eric on 11.04.05 at 09:15 AM





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Femocrats vs. Transcendental Scientists again, I see. A Leftist linking the feminine with pacifism and with Communism. I'm against that.

Instead, I'll stand with St. Jeanne d'Arc, Catholic French nationalist and monarchist, holy warrior and martyr. La Droite Extreme.

"The John Birch Society is unequivocally opposed to Communism.

The Catholic Church is unequivocally opposed to Communism. As early as 1846 Pope Pius IX pronounced a solemn condemnation. Pope Leo XIII defined it in his encyclical Quod Apostolici Muneris; and in 1937 Pope Pius XI in his encyclical Divini Redemptoris "exposed the errors and the violent, deceptive tactics of Bolshevistic and Atheistic Communism.""

-Stillwell John Conner, The Catholic Church and The John Birch Society

I must add that, not only did Pope Pius IX issue his Syllabus Errorum in 1864 listing errors of Communism, liberalism, and modernism, it was he who, in 1854, upheld the Immaculate Conception of Our Most Holy Virgin Mother as absolute holy dogma ex cathedra. And, then, in 1950, Pope Pius XII upheld the Assumption of Our Most Holy Virgin Mother as absolute holy dogma ex cathedra. Whosoever denies or questions these holy dogmas, let him be anathema! Let him know that he has fallen from the Divine and Christian faith!

Yes, the Catholic Church has had some outstanding Popes. In Catholic theology, Our Most Holy Virgin Mother Mary, Immaculately Conceived and Assumed Bodily into Heaven, is The Queen of Heaven. And She is also Co-Redemptrix with the Christ.

The Queen of Heaven -- Mary, Isis, Inanna. Eternal. My Most High Goddess. She for Whom the Universe was created. She than Whom nothing greater can be conceived. She Who exists so truly that She cannot be thought not to exist. (Atheism is therefore an error of the will rather than of the intellect.)


What is this numbskull even *talking* about?!

B. Rintoul   ·  November 4, 2005 12:57 PM

After re-reading your blog post, I have to ask - Is anyone *forcing* you to buy prints for $100?

"stultification"!? Ha! Throw away your thesaurus and get over *yourself* already.

B. Rintoul   ·  November 4, 2005 01:02 PM

A Transcendental Femocracy....!

1. A blogger is no cheap sell-out
2. Self-absorbtion isn't art - it's pathological narcissism. As a shrink, I know this.
3. Some people will do anything for attention
4. Who cares what artists have to say about anything - including art? Real artists are just people.

bird dog   ·  November 4, 2005 06:59 PM


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