The Street Artist Who Won’t Quit: The Story Of Shepard Fairey

The Artist Did Not Think It Would Take Off

“I thought it would only be a few weeks of mischief. At first, I was only thinking about the response from my clique of art school and skateboard friends. The fact that a larger segment of the public would not only notice, but investigate, the unexplained appearance of the stickers was something I had not contemplated. When I started to see reactions and consider the sociological forces at work surrounding the use of public space and the insertion of a very eye-catching but ambiguous image, I began to think there was the potential to create a phenomenon,” Fairey told AIGA, the Professional Associated for Design.

It wasn’t long before he learned how the law could interfere with his art…