Gauntlet Gallery
What is Shepard Fairey’s piece called “Sunset & Vine Billboard”?
Artist Statement
18 x 24? Screen Print, Signed and Numbered Edition of 450. $45. Limit 1 per person/household. Release Date: 3/31/2011
Summary
Sunset & Vine Billboard is a 2011 Shepard Fairey screen print published by Obey Giant, released March 31, 2011 in a signed and numbered first edition of 450 at 18 x 24 inches. The image documents one of Fairey's large-scale public billboard works, translating an outdoor street-art installation into a collectible print format. It pairs Fairey's familiar bold graphic vocabulary with decorative, vine-and-flower motifs noted in the source theme data. As a billboard-derived edition, it sits within Fairey's ongoing practice of moving imagery between public walls and editioned paper.
Why It Matters
This print belongs to Fairey's recurring habit of capturing his public, site-specific work and reissuing it as an affordable editioned object, letting collectors own a piece of a project most people only encountered outdoors. The Sunset & Vine location ties the image to Los Angeles, Fairey's home base, and to the billboard format that has been central to how his work reaches non-gallery audiences. At a $45 release price and an edition of 450, it was positioned as an accessible entry point rather than a marquee release, which is exactly why such prints matter for building a representative Fairey collection. The vine and floral elements signaled by the source theme connect it to Fairey's broader decorative-pattern language, where ornamental framing softens and complicates his otherwise propaganda-derived graphic style. For collectors, the appeal is documentary and contextual: it preserves a specific public artwork at a specific moment in 2011, anchored to a real release date and a modest, verifiable edition. It rewards those who value Fairey's street-to-print pipeline over his single iconic images.
Collector Perspective
This appeals to collectors who follow Fairey's billboard and public-art projects and want printed records of installations tied to specific locations like Sunset & Vine. At 18 x 24 inches it is an easy-to-frame size that fits gallery walls of mixed Fairey editions without dominating them. Buyers assembling a chronological 2011 run, or a themed grouping of his location-based billboard prints, will value it as a connective piece. Its decorative vine motif also makes it display well alongside Fairey's floral and pattern-driven work. Because it was an accessible $45 edition of 450, it suits newer collectors entering the market as much as completists rounding out a set.
Historical Context
Sunset & Vine Billboard sits in Fairey's prolific 2011 output, a period when Obey Giant was issuing a steady stream of editions, including a cluster of location-named billboard prints such as the San Diego and SF works released in the same weeks. By 2011 Fairey was well past his early sticker-and-poster phase and operating as an established studio artist whose public installations regularly fed his print program. This piece exemplifies that mature pipeline: an outdoor billboard becomes a signed, numbered serigraph for collectors. The decorative floral framing reflects the ornamental vocabulary Fairey had been developing across the late 2000s and into the 2010s, blending his propaganda-rooted graphic style with patterned, almost Art-Nouveau-inflected detailing.
FAQ
What is Sunset & Vine Billboard and when was it released?
It is a Shepard Fairey screen print published by Obey Giant and released on March 31, 2011. It was issued as a signed and numbered first edition of 450 at 18 x 24 inches, with a release price of $45 and a limit of one per person or household.
How large is the edition?
The print is a signed and numbered first edition of 450. According to the source, there was a purchase limit of one per person or household at release, reflecting Obey Giant's standard accessible-edition distribution model for this period.
What does the imagery reference?
The work derives from one of Fairey's public billboard projects associated with the Sunset & Vine location. Its source theme data also notes nature and floral symbolism, reflecting the vine and decorative motifs Fairey often integrates into his graphic compositions.
What medium and size is the print?
It is a screen print measuring 18 x 24 inches, published by Obey Giant in 2011. It is signed and numbered in an edition of 450, making it an editioned serigraph rather than an open or unsigned reproduction.
Related Works
About the Artist
Shepard Fairey (b. 1970, Charleston, South Carolina) is an American street artist, graphic designer, and activist, and a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design. His 1989 “André the Giant Has a Posse” sticker grew into the global OBEY GIANT campaign — an ongoing experiment in propaganda, obedience, and visual culture. He reached worldwide recognition with the 2008 “Hope” portrait of Barack Obama, now held by the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery. Across screen prints, stencils, murals, and collage, Fairey channels propaganda aesthetics toward themes of peace, justice, environmentalism, and civil rights. His work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Victoria & Albert Museum, and LACMA.