Gauntlet Gallery
What is Shepard Fairey’s piece called “Red Hot Chili Peppers - Feel The Bern (First Edition)”?
Artist Statement
“I’m supporting Bernie Sanders for President because I think that he’s the candidate most likely to work for the needs of normal people, not the wealthy and powerful. He believes in campaign finance reform and is practicing what he preaches by not accepting corporate donations or creating Super PACs.” – Shepard Shepard designed the poster for the Red Hot Chili Peppers show with special guests and DJ Z-Trip at The Theatre at Ace Hotel in Los Angeles. The show is taking place Friday, Feb. 5th with all proceeds to benefit Bernie Sander’s campaign.
Summary
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Feel The Bern (First Edition) is a 2016 Shepard Fairey screen print, 18 x 24 inches, published by Obey Giant in a first edition of 550. Fairey designed the poster for the Red Hot Chili Peppers show with special guests and DJ Z-Trip at The Theatre at Ace Hotel in Los Angeles on February 5th, with proceeds benefiting Bernie Sanders's campaign. The source includes Fairey's statement that he supports Sanders for President as the candidate most likely to work for ordinary people, citing Sanders's stance on campaign finance reform and refusal of corporate donations. The print joins music and political activism in a single piece.
Why It Matters
This print sits at the intersection of two pillars of Fairey's work: music culture and political activism. It was created as the concert poster for a Red Hot Chili Peppers benefit show supporting Bernie Sanders's 2016 presidential campaign, with the source documenting Fairey's personal endorsement and his emphasis on Sanders's campaign finance reform stance and rejection of corporate money. That ties the piece directly to Fairey's recurring critique of money in politics, giving it relevance beyond a standard band poster. The collaboration with the Red Hot Chili Peppers and DJ Z-Trip, and the specific venue and date at the Ace Hotel in Los Angeles, anchor it as a documented cultural-political event artifact. With a signed-and-numbered-scale first edition of 550 published by Obey Giant, it is accessible yet distinctly collectible for those who track Fairey's music-poster output or his political prints. For collectors, the print is a rare convergence of band collaboration, election-cycle activism, and Fairey's consistent message about getting corporate influence out of politics.
Collector Perspective
This print draws two collector audiences: fans of Fairey's music and concert-poster work and collectors of his political and campaign-related output. Tied to a Red Hot Chili Peppers benefit show for Bernie Sanders, it carries crossover appeal for music memorabilia collectors and progressive political collectors alike. At 18 x 24 inches in a first edition of 550, it is accessible while still edition-limited, and it displays strongly as a bold concert poster. It fits collections organized around Fairey's music series or his money-in-politics themes, and pairs with his other power-and-consumerism prints. The documented event details, venue, date, and the Sanders benefit, give it a specific provenance story collectors value.
Historical Context
Released in February 2016 during the Democratic primary season, this print reflects Fairey's direct engagement with the Bernie Sanders campaign and his broader concern with campaign finance reform. It continues his long practice of creating concert posters, here for a Red Hot Chili Peppers benefit show with DJ Z-Trip at the Ace Hotel in Los Angeles. By pairing a music event with explicit political fundraising, the work illustrates how Fairey merged his music-poster tradition with electoral activism. The source's inclusion of his personal endorsement of Sanders, framed around getting corporate money out of politics, situates the print within the same anti-corruption thread that runs through much of his mid-2010s output.
FAQ
What was this print made for?
Fairey designed it as the poster for a Red Hot Chili Peppers show with special guests and DJ Z-Trip at The Theatre at Ace Hotel in Los Angeles on February 5, 2016, with proceeds benefiting Bernie Sanders's campaign.
What is the edition size?
It is a first edition of 550, an 18 x 24 inch screen print published by Obey Giant in 2016, with an original price of $60.
Why did Fairey support Bernie Sanders?
The source quotes Fairey saying he supported Sanders as the candidate most likely to work for normal people, citing Sanders's belief in campaign finance reform and his refusal to accept corporate donations or create Super PACs.
Is this both a music and a political print?
Yes. It is a concert poster for a Red Hot Chili Peppers benefit show and an explicit political fundraiser for the Sanders campaign, combining Fairey's music and political activism.
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.