Stealing Celebrity Images For Fun And Profit
Street art, culture jamming, anti-corporate activism, celebrity loathing, celebrity worship-it's all mixed up into a vast cultural stew these days, making the individual messages of many artists hard to parse. When in doubt just assume the message is, "I'm trying to get famous." British artist James Cauty has taken a pop art style, combined it with an advertising-remix motif, and sprinkled in a little blatant fame whoring to cap it all off. He's just commandeering billboards with pieces about celebrities saying how much they love him, and you have to admit that really crystallizes pop culture circa 2008. Plenty of people with day jobs in advertising dream about having the balls to do this (illegally). Pictured, Cauty's image and billboard theft starring Kate Moss; below, another one with celebrity chef Nigella Lawson.