Poster Boy is an anonymous New York City based street artist whose only utensil is a razor. His supplies? The posters adorning the walls of subway platforms across Manhattan. Poster Boy has been creating guerrilla collage art thick with political satire in the streets & subways of New York City since the Spring of 2008. He cuts out sections of self-adhesive advertisements & pastes the poster pieces back up in new bizarre, often brilliant, configurations.
"Eye Yam" by Poster Boy
“At first, it was just something to keep me occupied while waiting on the subway,” Poster Boy told Ben Walters of The Guardian. The artist discovered that, unlike the cardboard posters in the subway trains, the advertising posters on the subway platforms themselves were printed on self-adhesive material that could be quickly pasted back up after being torn or cut out. In 2008 alone he created over 200 underground collages from posters in the NYC subway systems.
"so don't blink" by Poster Boy & Aakash Nihalani
Poster Boy has no preconceived notions when creating & compares his poster mash-ups to hip-hop freestyling. “I don’t have anything planned… go there, see something, get inspired and do the work.” He uses the images available, often in ways that relate to current events.
"UseLess" by Poster Boy
“The pieces generally have a critical edge to them, making comments on the state of society and on the advertisements themselves,” noted one blogger. Poster Boy has been referred to as the “Matisse of subway mash-ups,” “a kind of anti-consumerist Zorro,” and “an anti-consumerist guerilla artist.” He considers his work “a social thing, as opposed to being an artist making things for bored rich people to hang above their couch.”
"911 cover up" by Poster Boy
“I want it to be free of copyright and free of authorship, as much as possible,” says the artist. “The overall goal for Poster Boy is to inspire others. I’d love to see people take up the Poster Boy model and create change within their environment.” “No matter what I do to the piece, as long as I did something to those advertisements and that saturation, it’s political. It’s anti-media, anti–established art world.”
As Poster Boy‘s fame has spread, other artists have begun to emulate his techniques. If these are unconnected individuals copying the original artist, or part of the “Poster Boy movement” has not been publicly confirmed.
"It's Natural" by Poster Boy
The collages are transitive in nature, generally torn down by Metro Transit Authority employees, but are recorded in photographs & displayed on Poster Boy‘s flickr photostream. He has collaborated with street artist Aakash Nihalani, who uses brightly colored strips of electrical tape to create three dimensional geometric patterns.
"HeadsonClasson" by Poster Boy & Aakash Nihalani
Poster Boy‘s activities are, of course, illegal, however the art wasn’t initially much of a priority for MTA police. “Vandalism of our property is illegal, and we prosecute to the fullest extent of the law,” spokesperson Aaron Donovan told New York Artsreporter Brian Raftery. “That being said, the problem to date has been minimal.”
"You R What U Listen 2" by Poster Boy
Poster Boy had several brushes with the transit police, but on various occasions they’ve let him go with a warning. However, on January 30, 2009 a man presumed to be Poster Boy was arrested by undercover officers. Henry Matyjewicz, 27, was charged with two misdemeanor counts of criminal mischief.
Henry Matyjewicz, aka Poster Boy
In the beginning, Poster Boy‘s work was illicit & the artist claimed, “I don’t want to make any money off of it. I don’t want to bring it into the galleries.” However, following his arrest, Poster Boy‘s work has begun to show in galleries including a one-person show in Brooklyn – a move criticised by the street art blog community.
"Your mom is anti-painting" by Poster Boy
In an interview with Matt Harveyof theNew York Press, Matyjewicz explains, “Like I said, the evidence that was thrown against me, these are random posters that were vandalized and not for what was at the show. It was a legal piece. They went to the show on the suspicion that Poster Boy was going to be there since that was on the flyer and since I was working on the legal piece, they were like, ‘This is Poster Boy, let’s get him.’ So it was kind of expected in a way.”
"Limelight" by Poster Boy
Henry Matyjewicz was sentenced to 11 months time on Riker’s Island. It seems the judge had initially made a ruling in Henry‘s favor that would have allowed him to avoid serving jail time, however Matyjewicz failed to appear in court and had to do time.
"That's how you spell diversity" by Poster Boy
Fans & followers of the art criminal are outraged, spawning a “SavePoster Boy” movement including the “Free Poster Boy!” Facebook group. “I just hung up the phone with Poster Boy’s lawyer, Kerry Gotlib, a few minutes ago,” Free Poster Boy! group moderator Adri Cowan said in an update, “who said that PB was granted bail from an appeals judge this past Friday and is just waiting for paperwork to go through – and that he’ll be out on bail within the next few days!” Henry Matyjewicz is currently out on bail as of May 20th, 2010.
Sean Hillen: An Unfortunate & Impossible Explosion
“I suppose I was very lucky, in that I had the motivation to make the montages, the material in the photographs I’d been taking, and that the medium lends itself perfectly to dialectic and political satire, which is what they are, to some extent. I originally was taking straight photographs for exhibit as fine-art practice, and then began sort of ‘embroidering’ them with found bits and pieces, but in the end I was taking the photos specifically for use in montages. I also believe they’re to some extent ‘thought experiments’, and adventures, trying out my ideas on myself and you rather than hitting you over the head with them.” – Sean Hillen
