Icon Making: Building a Movement

“At first I was only thinking about the response from my clique of art school and skateboard friends. The fact that a larger segment of the public would not only notice, but investigate, the unexplained appearance of the stickers was something I had not contemplated. When I started to see reactions and consider the sociological forces at work surrounding the use of public space and the insertion of a very eye-catching but ambiguous image, I began to think there was the potential to create a phenomenon.“
-Shepard Fairey

From Steven Heller. “Interview with Shepard Fairey: Still Obeying After all These Years”

We all saw how this changed the entire landscape of the 2008 Presidential race.  Street artist Shepard Fairey distributed 300,000 stickers and 500,000 “HOPE” posters during the campaign.  Over a timeframe that could be measured in months, the public’s perception of Barack Obama developed from a vague sense of unfamiliarity to a degree of complete captivation.

How much of this shift could be attributed to the “HOPE” poster phenomenon is a good question.  Even following the town hall meetings, speeches, campaign ads, and everything else on the campaign trail, I would argue that many voters had only an abstract understanding of Barack Obama the candidate and what he stood for.

This lack of actual knowledge on the public’s part shouldn’t at all be surprising.  Compare this to a statement from the website of Fairey’s other famous project, the Andre the Giant OBEY sticker campaign:

“The sticker has no meaning but exists only to cause people to react, to contemplate and search for meaning in the sticker.”

In the same notion, the purpose of the HOPE image was not to inform the public in any sense, but to arouse its viewers to draw associations, create meaning, and produce emotional reactions.  The summation of these responses — which only existed in voters’ minds — became the embodiment of the public’s interpretation of Barack Obama.

It would almost seem remiss, however, to write the entire HOPE poster campaign off as simple propaganda, if for no other reason than because I do not believe the public at large could create this perception from the imagery if they did not have the unmet desire to build these perceptions in the first place. In this sense, the distinction between the advertiser and demagogue is a blurry one at best. I am not entirely convinced that an entire society voted for the idea of Barack Obama rather than the candidate himself. The only thing I would conclude is that voters attached themselves — and eventually elected — the ideal of Barack Obama as much as the person and his platform.

What I’m trying to get at here is how we as promoters can draw upon this for Ron Paul’s 2012 campaign. At present, I do not think most voters have a true familiarity with Dr. Paul, where he stands on the issues, or his campaign platform.  How to create a sense of curiosity in Ron Paul the candidate with the public at large, along with developing emotional connections and responses, are the primary goals of this endeavor.  This is, in essence, what I am trying to accomplish with the “Listen to Ron Paul.” campaign.

Please comment … I’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas on this.

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