The Urban Art of Shepard Fairey

The Clarion Content was not familiar with the urban Art of Shepard Fairey until the recent controversy about his Obama poster was in the news. We had seen the famous "Obey" image pictured above, but not Fairey's first stickers, "André the Giant has a Posse," which were originally seen in skate culture and around Providence, Rhode Island.

The "Obey" image reportedly was developed when Fairey was warned the André the Giant, the wrestler's name, was trademarked by Titan Sports, Inc. His redo with the word, "Obey" made a huge splash. He has replicated more than 500,000 stickers and the image campaign has been copied and homaged in graffiti, posters and stickers worldwide. Fairey graduated RISD, the Rhode Island School of Design. His Obey campaign spawned a clothing line, and a fascinating reiterating and recalibrating of the original design.

According the Giant.org, this is the Obey Manifesto,

"The Obey campaign can be explained as an experiment in Phenomenology. The first aim of Phenomenology is to reawaken a sense of wonder about one's environment. The Obey campaign attempts to stimulate curiosity and bring people to question both the campaign and their relationship with their surroundings. Because people are not used to seeing advertisements or propaganda for which the motive is not obvious, frequent and novel encounters with Obey propaganda provoke thought and possible frustration, nevertheless revitalizing the viewer's perception and attention to detail. The medium is the message."

Yo Yo Da

Ladies and Gentlemen, give it up for the Jedi Master cellist.

Erotic museum to close

You may recall the Clarion Content warned not long ago of financial turbulence hitting the porn industry. Here is another indicator of the tough times. After a failed eleventh hour search for potential investors, the Museum Erotica in Copenhagen faces bankruptcy.

The City Council's cultural committee has denied a request for fiscal support and the museum may be forced to sell off its extensive collection of erotica.

Hanne Stensgaard, the museum's C.E.O. told the The Copenhagen Post, "We've been hopeful [of securing investors] for a long time and miracles can happen, but if we don't get the funding within a week, we will have to close." Stensgaard estimates the museum is 2 to 3 million kroner short on the expenses of a current rebuilding project.

The museum houses better than 1,500 artifacts and pictures depicting erotica through the ages. Among some of dedicated exhibitions are those detailing the history of Playboy magazine as well as Marilyn Monroe, among others.

Many celebrations had been planned for this season as it will mark the 15th anniversary since the museum opened on Købmagergade Street in central Copenhagen. 2008 also marks the 40th anniversary of the legalization of pornography in Denmark.

"We think it's very important that people know about sexual and erotic history as it defines many gender roles today," said Stensgaard.

Ahhh, but what an opportunity for other collectors of erotica to buy during a limp market.

Clap, Clap, Clap

Ha! I promise an update in the next few days, but this math nerd punnery achieved such transcendence that I just HAD to share. Props per usual to xkcd.

Score one for the animals

Mayor Michael Bloomberg met a recalcitrant constituent up-close and personal Monday morning in Staten Island. Chuck the Groundhog was clearly not interested in the Mayor's Groundhog Day photo-op. He bit the mayor’s left hand, his piercing teeth penetrating Mr. Bloomberg’s fancy black leather gloves.

The New York Times describes the Mayor's moment, sounds like he got what he deserved,

"As cameras rolled and the crowd took in the event — a local imitation of the Punxsutawney Phil tradition — Chuck at first refused to come out. Children chanted his name to no avail. Mr. Bloomberg seemed to realize that the reclusive rodent was spoiling the show.

He tried to lure Chuck out of his cottage with an ear of corn, but Chuck shrewdly grabbed the corn and dragged it inside to enjoy. The mayor tried again, twice, but then, seemingly out of patience, he grabbed Chuck by the belly with both hands before he could hide again and held him up in the air for everyone to see.

By then, the mayor had already been bitten."

City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, clearly sucking up to the Mayor and the media, blamed the groundhog, "I made it out alive: no bites, no scratches. But I kept a little bit more of a distance from the groundhog. I knew him not to be the jolliest fellow. But I didn’t know he was nasty."

Podcast killed the radio star

Bill Simmons, the Clarion Content's favorite sports columnist, made a fascinating prediction in a pre-Super Bowl chat the other day. Here it is...

I love doing the podcasts and feel like I'm on the ground floor of a medium that is really starting to take off. It's like radio on demand and I think it's going to kill satellite radio in 2 years. I really do. It's also a huge threat to real radio in my opinion, especially when people can get internet in their cars and can just cue podcasts up within 3 clicks. It's astonishing to me that nobody has written a long piece about podcasts yet. This is EXACTLY the same as what happened with sportswriting in the late-90s where nobody was taking the internet seriously and suddenly within 7 years there were a million sports blogs, mainstream sites were crushing newspapers and newspapers were hemorrhaging money. We are headed that way with podcasts. I just think radio is going to become much more niche-oriented over these next 10 years... people don't see it yet. Christian Slater in "Pump Up The Volume" is going to look like a genius.

Links were added ex post facto by the Clarion Content.

Comcast, Arizona, really?

Evan Stone, it was his Johnson.

A saboteur, allegedly, got into Comcast Cable's non-high definition feed of the Super Bowl in the Tuscon, Arizona area. The Tuscon Citizen reports that, "Just after Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald scored a dramatic touchdown in the fourth quarter...30 seconds of pornographic content was aired." Talk about a whoopsie.

According the Citizen, "Comcast cable TV customers saw a video clip with full-frontal male nudity. It originated from Shorteez, an adult pay-per-view channel...a second clip showed about 10 seconds of end credits for Club Jenna." Wow! The Clarion Content can report that we didn't see anything like that in Durham, North Carolina. Anything that interrupted that dramatic fourth quarter Sunday would have made us mighty mad. We can't even imagine how Cardinals fans in Arizona must have felt.

In typical modern American fashion, Comcast is offering to payoff consumers whose broadcasts were disrupted by what it calls, an "isolated, malicious act." Their offer, ten dollars in credit off of their next cable bill. Move over Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake, you have been topped.

See the GRAPHIC video here.