Nike Stages Art Tour: Shepard Fairey
by Ariston Anderson
After Andre the Giant and Barack Obama, the latest person to be immortalized by Shepard Fairey is seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong. Fairey created a giant mural for the Nike-backed Stages Art Tour, a global traveling exhibition to benefit the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF). Lucky for Armstrong, who has admitted to being a serious Fairey collector, the artist will also be among several others who will paint the bikes Armstrong will ride in the Giro d'Italia and Tour de France this year.
On Saturday, 700 cyclists took to the streets of Hollywood with Armstrong for a 2.2 mile ride, launching the show. Among the 22 artists commissioned for the tour are Marc Newson, Os Gemeos, Tom Sachs, Kenny Scharf, Taryn Simon, Eric White and Christopher Wool, who will create work to raise awareness about cancer. The show will cumulate in Paris, on 16 July 2009, at the Emmannuel Perrotin Gallery, going on to visit New York, L.A. and Portland. Both sales of the work, as well as proceeds from two new Nike lines, "Hope Rides Again" apparel and footwear and "Greatest Hits" footwear, will go toward the LAF and their constant mission to find a cure for cancer.
