Unfortunately for us alternative seekers, it’s not 1982 anymore. Or even 1989, when the first André stickers went up. The McLuhan argument seems a little thin now that “Obey” images share space on city lampposts and billboards with their corporate progeny: “guerrilla” marketing, street teams, and other attempts to capitalize on graffiti culture. Fairey is a victim of his own success. The more popular “Obey” becomes, the more it becomes a brand, fading into the visual background noise of the marketing it was meant to undermine.

Interestingly, Obama faces the same problem. If there is a fine line between art and commerce, the division between leader and politician is almost nonexistent. Obama is the first leader in a generation, but in today’s world of political messaging, when campaigns are marketed like products, it seems almost impossible to overcome the inherent tension of selling yourself as the genuine article. As an outsider candidate with sudden broad appeal, Obama must negotiate an evertrickier path. So far, his claim that he’s not just another politician seems to have won people over: unprecedented new voter registration, almost 2 million small donors (as of early September), 75,000 citizens showing up at a routine campaign stop in Portland, Oregon, and a 200,000-strong crowd in Berlin. If the medium is also the message in politics, then Obama may have already revived the Republic.

All of which is why Fairey’s iconic Obama image works so well. At a time when artists make little, if any, contribution to the political mood of the country, it is refreshing to watch drivers craning their necks to return Obama’s massive gaze along Sunset Boulevard. Fairey gives Obama iconic resonance, stripping his image to the basics: edges, colors, impact, hope. And with Obama, the artist found some substance. In the service of an organic movement, his aesthetic takes on the meaning missing from “Obey.” The Obama poster offers a real alternative to a totalitarian world. And you don’t need any wrestlers with special glasses to see it.

"Street Cred" originally appeared in the October 2008 issue of Modern Painters. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Modern Painters' October 2008 Table of Contents.