Shepard Fairey: Supply & Demand

Image courtesy TIME Magazine

The Institute of Contemporary Art presents Shepard Fairey: Supply & Demand in partnership with Levi's and The Boston Phoenix. This exhibition – featuring over 80 of Fairey's works – will run from Friday, February 6 through Sunday, August 16 at The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) in Boston. The ICA is located at 100 Northern Avenue in Boston. Admission is $10 - $12 except on Target Free Thursdays, when it's free after 5:00pm!

The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) is proud to open the first ever museum survey of Shepard Fairey on the 20th anniversary of Fairey's infamous Obey Giant campaign. Since then, stickers and posters of the artist’s work have appeared on street signs and buildings around the world as part of a guerrilla art campaign of global scale.

The exhibition traces the influential street artist’s career over twenty years, from the Obey Giant stencil to screen prints of political revolutionaries and rock stars, to recent mixed-media works and a new mural commissioned for the ICA show. Included in the more than eighty works on display is the now iconic Barack Obama print which became popular during his campaign, and even inspired another image created for the cover of Time Magazine,specifically for the Person of the Year issue honoring Obama. In complement to the exhibition, Fairey will be creating public art works at sites around Boston.

He started installing works around the area in October, and has a lot more planned for February as he builds up to the show. In an exclusive interview, Fairey explains that having spent eight years in Providence - and much of that time in and around Boston - this exhibition "it's kind of a homecoming."

Asked about the breadth of the exhibition, Fairey notes that it "provides a full career overview, which is important because my humbled beginnings yielded more primitive art that I hope people see as evocative and engaging. The techniques and ideas haven't changed, but you can see that it evolved." He further explains: "Some people will see the older pieces and not see it as 'real' art - just like people did with Lichtenstein, Kruger, and Warhol - but it's important for people that will contemplate the work. I wasn't born as some technical virtuoso, it's more like when punk rock came along. I want people to be inspired, to make art in some capacity regardless of their skill level."

On view at the ICA from Feb. 6 to Aug. 16, 2009, Shepard Fairey: Supply & Demand is accompanied by an expanded, limited-edition version of Supply & Demand, the retrospective publication of the artist’s work.

Shepard Fairey's integration of design, popular culture, and politics places him in the current of artistic and cultural forces that shape our world today.

“Shepard Fairey’s powerful and varied body of work has reached into all aspects of our visual culture, from political posters to t-shirts and album covers, and now museum installations,” says Jill Medvedow, Director of the ICA/Boston. “His integration of design, popular culture, and politics places him in the current of artistic and cultural forces that shape our world today.” Fairey himself notes that his hopes for his work extend far beyond himself. "I'm inspired by an audience without barriers. I'm a populist, as an artist. I want to put my work in front of people and engage them, however they feel. In it, I want them to explore a whole world, a grassroots way of doing things." Most importantly, Fairey notes that he wants to "empower people to express themselves."

Image courtesy Institute of Contemporary Art

A recent feature by Time Magazine referred to Shepard Fairey as an icon-maker, in conjunction with their selection of president-elect Barack Obama as their Person of the Year, 2008. The now infamous ever-present image he created of the president-elect was used as the cover of the Time Person of the Year issue. Fairey was honored by GQ Magazine as one of their Men of the Year, 2008 as The Artist.

When asked about how his work came to cross paths with the presidential campaign of now president-elect Barack Obama, Fairey notes that they shared a common worldview in their belief of "change from the bottom up." A lot of what Obama believes in resonates with Fairey, whose iconic print has become one of the most symbolic images that mark a historic election, and stunning win, in the United States of America.

"Getting involved had a lot to do with the quality of the candidate. Obama is a theoretical antedote to the problems I've had with government in the past. I'm not a supporter of anyone unconditionally, but Obama is the right guy to turn the country around."

Image courtesy Institute of Contemporary Art

Fairey is excited to return to New England, where he has a lot of fond memories. Having spent eight years living in Providence, and as a former student of the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), he recalls many of his best memories being in or around Boston, pausing at one point to remark simply: "I love Boston!"

He calls Boston his "urban center" from 1988 to 1996. He recalls buying screenprinting supplies in Somerville, skating in Cambridge, trying to sell his t-shirts to Newbury Comics on Newbury Street, and checking out shows at the Middle East. He can even vividly describe the wall banks just outside Boston Medical Center where he used to try to skateboard, only to be chased down Massachusetts Avenue by security and police.

Boston? For me.. it's kind of a homecoming.

When asked about his success and career, he talks of paying forward the inspiration he took from artists that opened doors for him. He advises: "Take that spirit of rebellion, but also explore career outlets and stay inspired. It is possible!" Of course, he acknowledges that this may not be the road for everyone, especially street artists. "Street art can exist without being put under a microscope. Certainly higher levels of notoriety bring complexity, and not everyone can or wants to tackle that."