Personal Study

Shepard Fairey is an American street artist, activist, and graphic designer. His work is  known for having a unique bold style based on idealizing images. ‘I’ve never really considered myself a street artist. I consider myself a populist’ – Fairey sees himself as someone who cares for the ‘common people’, which we can see from his designs which are created to create awareness about specific problems or matters, such as climate change, income equality, sexism, and racism. He creates his work to spread the awareness about these modern issues and to try better them. This is to almost go against leaders and challenge them to do better and to solve issues that shouldn’t even exist in the first place. Fairey has produced many pieces of thought provoking and challenging work, with designs such as the HOPE poster, or the Fulbright poster, he usually puts the person or issue in question on the front of the poster, making it stand out with his bold illustrations. Text is also added in all of his designs, either to mock, or to spread a message.

I will research more about Shepard Fairey’s works, and how they are so effective, useful, and also why they became such a hit. I will also look into how they have change people’s views and ideas on important matters such as climate change.

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The Barack Obama HOPE Poster

This Design by Shepard Fairey represents Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and focuses on Barack Obama as it’s center of attention. It includes Obama’s Logo on his badge and has a bold text at the bottom of the design displaying “HOPE”. This goes along pleasantly with the point Fairey is trying to make. The word “HOPE” represents who Obama is as a person and what he lives for. It shows us the value of him and what he wants for the future of America. The colours used in the poster design represent the “American colours”, with red, white, and blue being very prominent colours, no other colours are really used except from a yellowish tinted white and a lighter blue,”. The red and blue combination makes a powerful statement and makes it very eye catching to the viewer as these colours are complete opposites. Overall, the design has a very simplistic colour choice and shape. Its composition is in the centre which is the most powerful way to draw attention to your subject and Fairey has made that clear. The subject matter of the poster design is of high importance as it is a word Fairey is looking to make and spread to the American population. Fairey is trying to portray his feelings that he sees power in Barack Obama and thinks he would make a ‘good’ president and will provide hope for the citizens of America, making this design very much a political piece of graphic design. The subject matter of the design is fully based on direct observation, with the intention to get the word of ‘HOPE’ out there into the American public. The design is very apparent at first glance with the colours of the American flag, the illustration of Obama and the word ‘HOPE’, which is a good quality to have when creating designs. Barack Obama, portrayed in the design was made using a photo taken by the freelance photographer Mannie Garcia, which he recreated to make a stylized stencil portrait of Obama. The poster was created in a day and was printed as a street poster, making it quite a quick design to make for how popular and famous it has gotten. Shepard Fairey is already very skilled at making designs, so making this was probably a walk in the park for him. He makes the viewer of this feel a sense of hope, as shown in the text below Barack Obama, it gives the public a massive push of hope as it feels very much like propaganda, with the form of the design. The design is very minimal and well thought out to make the viewer feel like they can easily understand the meaning behind it.

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Honest Gil Fulbright

The next design is “Honest Gil Fulbright” Poster design which has been arranged with Fulbright again being center of attention. He has money in his hand holding it to his heart, with a badge of the American flag and a dollar $ symbol. There is a bold text with the word ‘SOLD’ being shown at the bottom of the illustration of Fulbright. Again, Shepard Fairey uses a very limited colour scheme for this design, like he does with all his designs, with a red, blue, and white theme. The colours have great significance as they make up the colours of the American flag. The work is a detailed image of Fulbright, with it being another pleasing design to look at with its simplistic colours and illustration of Fulbright. Honest Gil Fulbright is based on the Kentucky politician, Honest Gil Fulbright, portrayed by the actor Frank L. Ridley. The word ‘SOLD’, along with the money and dollar symbol, refer to Fulbright’s quote, “I’m only in this thing for the money, but at least I’m honest about it”. The design heavily focuses on the idea of money as Fulbright is ‘only in this thing for the money’, with illustration of money being all over this design. The work is obviously a very powerful political message as many political leaders are all about the money and are never honest about a singular thing. Shepard Fairey designed this poster digitally. I presume this design didn’t take long, as it is an adaptation of The Barack Obama HOPE Poster, which only took 1 full day to create. The viewer of the design may see the greed in political leaders and feel a sense of anger towards the fact of corruption in the political side of the world. The designer, Shepard Fairey, feels very strongly towards the subject matter of the poster, with quotes such as “I fully agree with the campaigns stance that America’s biggest problems are going unsolved because our government is overrun by Big Money special interests and lobbyists”’. I think that the work gives a general sense of anger with the subject matter, and colours show off ‘power’. In this design having money makes you powerful, and greed is shown throughout the design.

In conclusion, I think that Shepard Fairey uses a very unique technique to convey his points and messages across to viewers. His designs have a general feel to them, with simplistic imagery, simplistic colour scheme, easy to understand message from what you’re observing. The bold imagery and use of word make it pop out to the viewers as well as its vibrant colours making it an easy eye opener and an easy way to make people understand the specific message he tries to convey. I can also see from his work and his quotes, such as ‘If being original means having to throw paint in front of a jet turbine to hit a canvas 50 ft away then let’s not be original’ and ‘My work is very much a melting pot of a lot of different influences’, that Fairey has been heavily inspired by others and that he does not deem his work as unique or original, he accepts the fact that his work is a collective of his inspirations and ideas. Showing him to be an understanding and honest person, making him a perfect person to be a role model, and to give his ideas on the issues he faces against.