Meeting Shepard Fairey

I have been following Mr. Shepard Fairey’s work since I was a teenager. He is a street art legend with a packed resume in both street credit (being arrested 18 times) as well as major institutions who get behind him. His work tells a message art history has been waiting for in a time that has never been so important to be a rebel for the truth.

On a late Tuesday afternoon, I was driving down Commerce street in dallas towards my studio and immediately recognized a new big mural going up, I knew instantly it was a Shepard Fairey piece. I didn’t even think twice about it, I pulled my car over and ran over to try to meet him.

There was a boom lift with 2 guys on it, and two guys on the ground floor stenciling in some masked tulip stripes on the street level, one of them was Fairey… in almost 100 degree Texas weather, age 52, with a very small crew with the caliber of artist he is… he was there spray painting his own work. I called out to him… “Are you Shepard Fairey”… he turned around… with almost a sigh in the heat of the Texas sun… and said “Yes.” My whole heart light up. I told him I was an artist and I had been following his work for over a decade. He said… “Thank you, Nice to meet you, Chelsea.” Which if you’re on this site… you might know… my name is Kelsey. I was honestly so excited, I didn’t even correct him. I drove to my studio and picked out one of my last framed, hand gold gilded limited edition prints and drove it up to him.

One more time I called out, “Mr. Fairey, I have a gift for you.” This time, he stopped working and came over to me. I told him, “Thank you for a moment of his time, as I realize you are in the middle of very important work.” I told him how much his art has influenced me and meant to me over the years. He said the print was really cool and asked me about the process of creating it… in which I briefly told him I was an oil painter, who then high definition scanned a painting, hand gold gilded it to create an original signed print. We talked about process for a minute and then I left. He said, he was going to put my art somewhere safe, which elated me. His new mural in the Dallas East Quarter at first glance seems like a friendly decorative painting about flowers next to a beautiful woman. At closer view and after hearing Fairey speak at the Dallas Contemporary, he speaks of the universal healthiness of a planet and good feeling that people get when they look at pretty flowers or a sunset. He spoke at the trouble that we are in as we continue to face global warming, and his new artwork in dallas clearly states this in the text “while supplies last.” This is the brilliance behind his work, its approachable to everyone, yet the deeper you look into his iconography, the complex, innovative, punchy statements are revealed.

Later in the week I watched him DJ some old school punk rock tunes at a VIP party, where he knew every word to some of these classic songs. I then went to his talk at the Dallas Contemporary museum where I was further educated on how brilliant of an artist and activist Mr. Fairey is.

He started from humble beginnings, with almost no money for materials, and a big dream. Turning his Andre the Giant sticker into an icon that has completely infratrated art history, his work covers a vast scope of humanitarian views offering hope to vulnerable populations of people, raising up the voices and rights of women, dismantling weapons of war, creating peace in the midst of police brutality, calling out societal issues backed by huge treasuries and exposing what they really are. He is a total work horse, creating a massive data base of imagery and pattern for his vast collection of artwork. His media expands beyond the canvas to wood, prints, sculptures, wheat paste and large murals. He pushes the boundaries of painting forward and uses art as a peaceful tool to create change. He has dedicated his life to questioning authority, taking risks and developing a style that is indistinguishable as his own. He mentioned that he hates apathy, that if you are apathetic to an issue, you might as well be on the side of the oppressor. He said he can’t sit back and do nothing. He said, when he started painting he would get into trouble for vandalizing neighborhoods and bringing property value down. Now he gets accused of gentrification. It seems the public has mixed reviews on the rebel artist. However as an artist myself, I found him quite humble, very thoughtful in his approach, and very peaceful. Listening to him talk really opened my eyes to his vast knowledge of social groups, government institutions and global politics that all come into play in work.

His art and to me more importantly his lifestyle imbued with his art making practice to effect change has been an example of a conscious, successful, peaceful artist that we have been waiting for. He is an activist with a vision of a better, healthier, more equal world. I hope he continues to come back to Dallas, Texas as his artwork is bringing up our entire community here. I look forward to the day I might shake his hand again, and tell him “Mr, Fairey, you are an art hero of mine, thank you for everything you have done.”