Shepard Fairey’s Iconic Obama Image Makes Time Magazine’s ‘Person of The Year’ Cover.
Tag Archive for 'Barack Obama'
I don’t know why I had completely absorbed myself in US politics over the past 12 months or so. After the last 8 years of the Bush tyranny reign, I had all but given up on believing that the United States of America - had any semblance of intelligence left. Sad.
It was with shock and awe that I would watch George W Bush mumble some sort of incoherant mumblings on the evening news. This… THIS is the leader of the ‘free world’? This bumbling chimpanzee was voted President. TWICE? Holy fuck. Can Americans truly be that stupid?
Bush’s reign will be remembered for the debacle that is the Iraq War. A war built on lies and deception. An invasion of a foreign country, no different to what Hitler did in Poland. Thousands of innocent lives lost for nought. On both sides of the guns. Death in daily doses and in living color on our TV screens.
Someone… anyone please inform me, what did Iraq have to do with the 9/11 disaster?
With great interest I, as an Australian born and bred, kept an eye across the Atlantic and hoped that my American friends would do the right thing and bring in a new man, a new voice, a new Party to power in this election.
Slowly momentum was growing for this young African/American man - Barack Obama. From out of nowhere he came onto the scene and wowed not only his country - but the entire world.
He was the one. Clear as day. The entire world could see this. But the question remained, would the United States see what was directly in front of them?
Rememebr, this is a country that voted Bush in twice. This is a country that seemed controlled by right-wing Christian zealots loonies. A country that wanted to ban stem cell research. A country wanting to teach their children that God created man. A country that came up with the term "Intelligent Design". A country that gave us… ladies and gentlemen… Sarah Palin!
Sarah Palin. Oh my God! (and as a devout atheist, I very rarely utter those words!)
And so today came.
I hardly got an ounce of work done all day. I was monitoring Twitter and riding every bump of the election with select online friends.
And then it finally happened… Barack Obama President Elect.
The United States of America arose from its 8 year slumber.
A nation and an entire planet can hope again.
Yes, they can hey?
Well done America! You finally did it!
Oh, and one more time:
Eat shit and die you redneck kook!
When the street artist and guerrilla marketer Shepard Fairey got word from the Obama people that they would welcome his contribution to the campaign, he knew what he wanted to create: a phenomenon.
All political art is propaganda (that is the point), but most political posters are bland, forgettable, wallpaper, like Fred Thompson on an off day. Fairey wanted something more iconic — aspirational, inspirational — and cool. In other words, he wanted to make posters that the cool cats would want. The 2008 Democratic primary season equivalent of the Che poster (with all that implies). More Mao, more right now. The kind of poster that might make its way onto dorm room walls of fanboys. The kind of poster that might sell on eBay, as a signed Fairey Obama recently did, for $5,900. He wanted his posters to go viral.
Coming straight from the Shepard Fairey camp is Fairey’s support for Barack Obama in the United States Presidential race.
“…I believe with great conviction that Barack Obama should be the next President. I have been paying close attention to him since the Democratic convention in 2004. I feel that he is more a statesman than a politician. He was against the war when it was an unpopular position (and Hillary was for the war at that time), Obama is for energy and environmental conservation. He is for healthcare reform. Check him out for yourself www.barackobama.com. Proceeds from this print go to produce prints for a large statewide poster campaign. Thanks. Shepard…”
As an Australian, the US election should mean jack-shit to me, but as a citizen of the World, I have more than a passing interest in getting Bush (and anyone or any Party associated with him) out of office. With that in mind, I’ll gladly post Shepard’s poster on this site and lend my support (however trivial) to Barack Obama.
Of course, the posters sold out almost instantly but if you missed out on getting the HOPE and PROGRESS posters, you can still help out the obama campaign by printing out your own obama paster here.
