Shepard Fairey

The OBEY GIANT campaign is rooted in the DIY counterculture of punk rock and skateboarding, but it has also taken cues from popular culture, commercial marketing and political messaging. Fairey steeps his ideology and iconography in the self-empowerment of those who refuse to be manipulated by the machine of manufactured consent. With biting sarcasm verging on reverse psychology, he goads viewers, using the imperative "obey," to take heed of the propagandists out to bend the world to their agendas.

In 2003, Fairey founded Studio Number One, a creative firm dedicated to applying his ethos wherever art and enterprise intersect. Building from Fairey's approach to design striking, thought-provoking work, the company has since evolved into its own creative entity and become one of the top boutique agencies in the country.

Fairey's art reached a new height of prominence in 2008, when his "HOPE" portrait of Barack Obama became the iconic image of the presidential campaign and helped inspire an unprecedented political movement. The original image now hangs in the Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.

Along with the Obama campaign, Fairey has also donated artwork and other contributions to charitable organizations such as the ACLU, MoveOn, Hope for Darfur, the Chiapas Relief Fund, marriage equality reform, 11th Hour Action, Hurricane Katrina relief, Southern California fire relief, shelters for L.A. teens, children's charities in Iraq and the U.S., Free the West Memphis 3, Feeding America, Adopt-a-Pet.com and the Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation.