Ironic: picture taking banned at Shepard Fairey exhibition

Obama Hope poster creator and street artist Shepard Fairey is the focus of a survey currently on at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art. Nothing out of the ordinary, except ironically, given he appropriates the work of others, you can’t take photos at the exhibition.

Christopher Knight, LA Times:

As soon as I snapped the photo above, a guard rushed over to admonish me that photography is not allowed in the show. “I’m not using a flash,” I replied. “Is that OK?” Nope, came the reply. “Must I obey?” I asked. “Yes,” she answered, missing or — more likely — ignoring my too-cute-by-half reference to Fairey’s trademark street-and-clothing campaign about authoritarian imagery, dubbed “Obey Giant.”

The guard was perfectly cordial and just doing her job. But I couldn’t help note the irony. A “no photographs” policy is in force in a show about an artist who is currently trading lawsuits over his guerrilla (meaning unauthorized) use of part of an Associated Press photographer’s published picture of Obama. I’m supportive of artists’ full participation in the “democracy of images” that seems to characterize our digital environment. I wonder what John Singleton Copley and John Quincy Adams would think?

Change you can believe in indeed ?

(img credit: LA Times)