Since I tend to filter most information and ideas i have on culture through the lens of visual art and it's histories, I was struck by some similarities between today's political campaign visuals and those of the recent past. First I have always seen the obvious connection between shepard fairey's work , on the left, and andy warhol's on the right. While Warhol was obsessed with celebrity, image, surface and american pop culture, Fairey is obsessed with the visuals of early 20th century soviet propaganda, late 20th century rock n roll, punk and skateboard culture. Both artists received tremendous attention in their lifetime and both embrace mechanical reproduction for artistic and practical reasons. When Fairey openly endorsed Obama with his iconic hope and change poster images he joined a long list of american artists who make presidential year artworks. I immediately saw the connection to Warhol's "Vote Mcgovern" poster which featured a picture of Nixon and was ironically using Nixon's image to make a typically warholian ambivalent statement "don't vote for nixon, mcgovern is mediocre but at least he is not NIxon". I had sort of forgotten about this but then on yesterdays episode of wait wait don't tell me , Mcgovern was a featured guest. They spoke about how nixon stole the election and was proven to be a crook. Mcgovern was incredibly humble and funny ,and even resisted the temptation to kick Nixon when he was down, but instead let the bad be interred with the bones instead of the good. So breaking with warhols approach shepard fairey's image gives us a positive endorsement of obama. Fairey recasts obama in his signature three color style based on an interpretation of propaganda posters but given a positive message with simple graphic style. In this version the typical red black and tan of faireys best known images is swapped out for a patriotic red white and blue. I go through all this because Fairey's style is just that a style, one he has used for the creation of numerous works for many years. His style is a filter he can apply to any message or visual he wants to present. And although his expressive style is devoid of the hand marks of many expressive works(the gestures on warhols juxatposed with the photo silkscreen image) it is no less imbued with the artist's mark. So when I hear those on the campaign trail and in the media refer to The obama image as "his own presidential seal" a subtle jab that both palin and mccain have used, I nearly choke on my art history. The implication of this is that obama designed and disseminated this image, but in fact it is fan art. Fairey did this independent of the obama campaign, just like warhol created his image independent of the McGovern campaign. Instead of damning the opposite though, faireys simply casts the candidate in a positive light. I think too often when artwork is used to promote a message we forget to look at the artwork as just art. For me I wonder what it says about contemporary artists, myself included, if the work and ideas we make are inexplicably linked to the work and ideas of artists from the 60's, the very generation we seem to be locked in an ideological struggle with today. It makes me think that indeed we are just witnessing a little bit of art history repeating.
