Dear Shepard Fairey,

My name Aura Bogado. Remember it. The fact that you have chosen, on more than one occasion, to incorrectly describe an exchange we had several years ago provides an opportunity for me to set the record straight; and it should result in an opportunity for you to move beyond your self-victimization. Although you assume I am Mexican, I am Argentine. Although you assume I am someone else's nameless property I am my own human being. And although you assume I am a young, dumb girl, I am intimately close to what I write and talk about.

Instead of using my name in your book, "Obey: Supply and Demand", you refer to me instead as an artist's girlfriend when you describe an email I sent you about a decade ago regarding a parody you created of Che Guevara (although I remember it instead as a public exchange we had at a gallery). In your book, when you describe me as "an outspoken Mexican girl", you write that I said that I referred to Che as "my compañero", and that I felt that you were desecrating my culture. You then go on to explain that "Che wasn't Mexican, he was Argentine." It's baffling that you would write that, as it is widely known that Che is considered a "compañero" throughout Latin America, including Mexico.

Suddenly, two years later, you tell a very different account of the conversation. In an interview published in the March/April 2008 issue of Mother Jones, you talk about me in this way:

"I met a girl who was Mexican, who got totally in my face about my parody of Che Guevara's image, which was based on the fact that it's already been really exploited to the point that it's become somewhat meaningless. And she was like, 'You desecrate my companero.' I was like, 'For one thing, he wasn't Mexican; he was Argentinean ...' It's like me saying that you insulted someone from Europe and I'm of European descent. It's such a stretch. She wasn't in the mountains with Che eating squirrels. It's just ridiculous."

I have to credit the fact that you do have one thing right in your latest tirade: I was never in the mountains with Che eating squirrels. Other than that, you are dead wrong. That brown girl whose name you seem to forget is not Mexican. That brown, nameless girl was instead born and raised in Argentina. That girl's father is a Communist who survived the atrocities of a brutal dictatorship. That girl has a brother who lectures on Guevarismo - a political teaching of communism derived from Che Guevara that focuses on radical social change through armed struggle. That girl grew up hearing story after story about El Che, and although she is not a Communist, she learned at an early age where Che was from and who he represents to her people. That girl is me, Aura Bogado, and it's no stretch to state that I never turned to you to learn my Che 101 - that would be ridiculous.

My apologies: did I say you only got one thing right in your rant? It seems I left something out - you mentioned that I said that you desecrate Che. I will write now what I said then: your work disrespects icons of color. That is what I remember about our conversation, I was trying (and obviously failed) to explain the way in which you culturally appropriate the images of icons of color, like Che and others, for capitalist gain. That was the crux of what I talked about. You never schooled me about where Che was from - his nationalities (we sometimes consider him Argentine and Cuban, not to mention that he was an Internationalist) never came up when we talked; yet somehow, nearly a decade later, something about the event just seems to stick with you. It seeps into your book, it seeps into your interview. I can only hope that an accurate account of our conversation will seep into your consciousness as well. As an artist, you are not forced to agree with my interpretation of your images - but as a human being, you should be held accountable to tell the truth. Good luck with that one.
Sincerely,
That Brown Girl (also known as Aura Bogado)

Could you please copy/paste or link to where he called you 'that brown girl?'

Your insinuation here is quite troubling, though it does help to paint your need for attention.

Che wasn't Mexican, but he sure did look like Cantinflas!

*Not to mention when interrogated by Bolivian rangers before his execution, Che declared a pan Latin American identity...

His response to the last question is one of the most arrogant and misguided rants I've read in a long time (Pro-Clinton rants notwithstanding).

Aura,
I think you are extrapolating a lot based on your assumptions. I don't think things were stated by me the way you are interpreting them. I never said that you didn't know where Che was from. However, I be glad never to mention you again. By the way, I was told you were Mexican by more than one person, it was not an "ignorant" assumption I made.

-Shepard

Thank you for speaking out for yourself, Aura Bogado. It's a shame that so many so called "radicals" get sucked in by Shepard Fairey's self serving appropriation of revoluntionary art. He is ultimately a Capitalist, who's "quality dissent" is manufactured in sweatshops in China. It is unfortunate that so many contemporary street artists continue to exploit the images and labor of people of color for their own profit and hype.

Short interview, but long enough for a blatant contradiction:

"A lot of the stuff that I do is designed to try to circulate things that I think are awesome back into a new crowd. Even if I'm like a hip-hop artist recontextualizing a piece like a sample, I'm not going to say I own it, because I don't feel that way. When I'm using someone else's work as a reference point, I'm just trying to give them props."

Vs.

"One of the reasons I started my clothing line was because I went into an Urban Outfitters and they were bootlegging my star logo on T-shirts. To see it in there, just ripped off, was definitely upsetting to me, because I was still totally broke at the time. And the reason I get pissed off about stuff like that is because I didn't build up the resonance for that image just to hand it off to someone to exploit."

Those darn Latino revolutionary artists ripped of the artistic effort of good white folk like Mayakovsky Lissitsky and Rodchenko. How dare they. As a Canadian of Ukrainian decent I'm really pissed off that they appropriated the revolutionary imagery of Eastern European white people. Not that I'm racist or anything. No sirree. But darnit, all Art is race specific and I'll be damned if a socially concerned person that isn't the same colour as the source image artist should be allowed to be inspired by it. Hell, that would be all crosscultural and stuff. Who knows where that could lead!!

I do not get this guy and the interview does not help much. His web site says he's into "dissent" and "propaganda" and he's also into corporate advertising. He's at the epicenter of this mass movement but doesn't have to explain what it means to him or anyone else. All we know is what the colors of the movement are and a few vague words like "hope" and "progress" that any political movement
(right or left) could easily appropriate for itself.

Shepard Fairey or Shepard Phoney?

actually the obvious, though unintentional, strength of his art is that he has been able to sell dissent to the masses. The move itself is rife with contradictions not only from fairey, who himself contributes to driving icons/movements to be "really exploited to the point that it's become somewhat meaningless", but also to the coffeeshop revolutionaries who buy his swag. Just like warhol, who added a second blank panel to a painting (to fetch twice the price), sheepherd has illuminated the contradictory and mindless nature of mass consumerism. To top it off, he's done it as a staunch capitalist. This would have been the move, but listening to his weak defenses against graphic plagiarism and use of revolutionary iconography, this is definitely not the intent.

Unfortunately, as the commercial sensationalism of the icons wear down, so will their once powerful messages. Because of his detachment from any revolutionary movement or strife, he is able to exploit powerful images (powerful to some) and render them to commercial fodder. Like wise, the market is so detached that they buy it.

Yes, we are the top 5% of the richest people on earth, and sheepherd has figured out how to sell us our own fuckin stupidity and, according to his interviews, he's also sold it to himself...

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