This Sunday New York Times piece is one more nail in poster-boy Shepard Fairey’s artistic coffin. The lede says it all:

Shepard Fairey, the artist whose “Hope” poster of Barack Obama became an iconic emblem of the presidential campaign, has admitted that he lied about which photograph from The Associated Press he used as his source, and that he then covered up evidence to substantiate his lie.

The back story, via the Times:

The A.P. claimed in January that Mr. Fairey owed it credit and compensation for using the photograph. But in February Mr. Fairey sued The A.P., seeking a declaratory judgment that the poster did not infringe on the agency’s copyrights and that he was entitled to the image under the “fair use” exception of the copyright law. The A.P.countersued in March, saying Mr. Fairey had misappropriated the photograph.

Beyond Fairey’s pathetic document-altering is the really phony part:

Last year Fairey sued a Texas graphic designer for doing to Fairey’s Andre the Giant “Obey Giant” posters what Fairey did to the AP’s Obama photograph. As the Austin Chronicle reported:

It all comes down to one of the great contemporary visual icons, called Obey Giant. The strange, stylized, brooding image of a face has become a global brand, a 20-year art phenomenon that melds street art, propaganda, and viral marketing. Created by graphic artist Shepard Fairey, the ubiquitous image has been an inspiration for a generation of graffiti, collage, and mash-up artists. One of those influenced was Austin graphic designer Baxter Orr, who did his own take on Fairey’s work: a piece called Protect, with the iconic Obey Giant face covered by a SARS (respiratory) mask. He started selling prints, marked as his own work, through his website.

Fairey, who claims his Obama Hope poster is “transformative” – and thus exempt from copyright restrictions –  seems to believe Baxter Orr’s transformation of Obey Giant isnt.

Fairey says Orr is [a] profiteer – not an artist but a mimic and “parasite” speculating in the secondary art market, by which dealers snap up a limited-edition print run of a work to resell at an artificially inflated price. It’s not illegal, but it is widely viewed in the art community as unethical. Fairey says Orr, in addition to copying his work, has been guilty of its mercenary exploitation as well. “I want people who are fans of the work to get them,” said Fairey, who sells his prints for $25-35 but has found them sold online for hundreds of dollars more. To crimp speculation, Fairey introduced a one print per customer limit. But Orr, he says, has used proxies to buy extra prints, to corner and gouge the market – an allegation Orr rejects.

Fairey can slice it thin as prosciutto, but the truth of the matter is:

Shepard Fairey is a phony.