Shepard Fairey OBEY – My Florist Is a Dick Damaged Stencil Series 2017
★ Originally Sold ONLY as a Complete 8-Print Set —
Individual Damaged Stencil Series prints are scarce on the secondary market. From Fairey's landmark "DAMAGED" exhibition at Subliminal Projects, Los Angeles, December 2017.
What You Are Getting
This is Shepard Fairey's My Florist Is a Dick — arguably the most darkly comedic print in the 2017 "Damaged Stencil Series," hand-signed and numbered from an edition of 400. Released exclusively in December 2017 as part of an 8-print set accompanying Fairey's landmark solo exhibition DAMAGED at Subliminal Projects in Los Angeles, these prints were never sold individually at retail. Each one on the secondary market comes from a collector who parted with the complete set — making single examples genuinely hard to find.
The image is deceptively simple: a riot police officer in full tactical dress — military uniform with insignia badges, visor helmet with face shield, baton on one hip, keys and handcuffs on the other — holds out a single large flower in the lower right of the composition. The bloom is a lotus or hibiscus: a symbol of peace, nature, and beauty. The joke is in the title's bluntness: this is your "florist." The state offering you a flower while dressed for confrontation, armed for control, face obscured behind protective glass. The gift and the threat inhabit the same body.
The background layers French-language newspaper text — fragments of a 19th-century political article referencing press law, government ministers, and "M. Félix Faure" (President of France 1895–1899, whose tenure coincided with the Dreyfus Affair) — beneath a decorative olive branch column pattern. Music notation sheets and a garment catalog reference ("LEATHER JA[CKET]," "Water Repellent") complete the cultural collage. The background isn't decorative filler: Fairey is placing this uniformed figure in the long history of state authority dressing itself in the language of civility and culture, while the baton, the cuffs, and the visor tell a different story.
Print Details
| Artist |
Shepard Fairey (OBEY) |
| Title |
My Florist Is a Dick |
| Series |
Damaged Stencil Series (8-print set) |
| Year |
2017 (December release) |
| Medium |
Offset lithograph — single-color black ink on cream Speckletone paper |
| Colors |
Black on cream — monochrome; balanced light/dark mix with strong cream ground areas |
| Size |
18" × 24" (46 × 61 cm) |
| Edition Number |
⚠ Not visible in photographs — please verify specific number (XX/400) from pencil notation on print before listing |
| Edition Size |
400 — hand-signed and numbered in pencil by Shepard Fairey |
| Signature |
Hand-signed by Shepard Fairey in pencil |
| Distressed Borders |
Dramatic torn/ragged edges (upper left and lower right) — intentional printed design elements, not paper damage |
| Exhibition |
"DAMAGED" — Subliminal Projects, Los Angeles, December 2017 |
| Publisher |
Obey Giant / Studio Number One |
| Original retail |
$160 for the complete 8-print set — sold out at release; never sold individually |
| Condition |
Excellent — crisp ink on cream paper; unframed, stored flat |
The Visual Argument — What Fairey Is Doing Here
The "florist" joke lands harder the more you look at the figure. This is not a casual officer — the uniform is formal military dress with shoulder epaulettes and a breast badge, the tactical face shield is down and locked, and the baton and restraint equipment are belt-ready. This is authority at its most ceremonially imposing. The single flower held toward the viewer with the free hand — a gesture that in any other context would suggest welcome, offering, peace — is reframed entirely by everything surrounding it. Fairey's title gives you the civilian's honest reaction to the juxtaposition. Your "florist" brought flowers and riot gear.
The French newspaper collage beneath the figure operates on a second register. The reference to Félix Faure and press law situates the print in a much longer history of governments managing civil unrest through both legal constraint and visible force — a history that predates 2017 by over a century. Fairey is reminding you that this dynamic is not new; the aesthetics evolve (the visor helmet is contemporary), but the relationship between the uniformed state and the civilian offering of a flower is ancient. The olive branch column on the left margin underscores this: the classical symbol of peace, here rendered as printed background texture beneath an armed figure.
Key Visual Elements — Confirmed from Photographs
What appears in the composition:
Central figure: Riot police officer in full tactical visor helmet and formal military dress uniform with insignia badges ·
Detail (left hip): Baton and keys/handcuffs hanging from belt ·
Detail (lower right): Single large lotus/hibiscus flower held outward ·
Background text: French-language newspaper article referencing "M. Félix Faure" and government press law ·
Background motif (left column): Decorative olive branch / botanical column pattern ·
Background collage: Music notation sheet fragments; garment catalog text ("LEATHER JA[CKET]," "Water Repellent") ·
Borders: Dramatic torn/ragged printed edges — upper left and lower right — intentional design elements
The Complete Damaged Stencil Series — All 8 Prints
Each print 18" × 24", offset lithograph on cream Speckletone, edition of 400 — December 2017:
| · |
Natural Springs — Woman in headscarf holding dripping lotus; oil derrick warning symbol |
| · |
Peace Guard 2 — Uniformed youth saluting a radiant dollar-sign sun |
| · |
Learn to Obey — Figure in uniform beneath propaganda-style text |
| · |
Freedom of Choice — Figure surrounded by consumer goods |
| · |
Proud Parents — Couple cradling a U.S. Treasury briefcase as newborn; "BLOOD" over religious text |
| · |
Printing Press — Typography and press imagery |
| ★ |
My Florist Is a Dick — Riot officer in full tactical gear holding a single flower; French newspaper and music collage background (This Print)
|
| · |
Sinking Liberty — Statue of Liberty partially submerged |
About the DAMAGED Exhibition (2017)
The context:
The Damaged Stencil Series was produced for Fairey's largest-ever solo exhibition, DAMAGED, at Subliminal Projects in Los Angeles — his own gallery — in December 2017. "DAMAGED is an honest diagnosis," Fairey said, "but diagnosis is the first step to recognizing and solving problems." The entire series abandons his signature red/cream/black palette and returns to raw monochrome: black stencil work on cream paper, evoking street art, underground leaflets, and political ephemera. Each of the 8 prints addresses a specific facet of the political and cultural damage Fairey perceived in the era.
About the Artist — Shepard Fairey (OBEY)
Born 1970 in Charleston, South Carolina, Shepard Fairey studied at the Rhode Island School of Design before launching his career with the Andre the Giant Has a Posse wheat-paste campaign — one of the first viral street art movements. His work is held in the permanent collections of the Smithsonian Institution, MoMA New York, LACMA, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. His 2008 Obama HOPE poster is among the most reproduced political images of the 21st century. My Florist Is a Dick represents Fairey in full satirical mode — using a single absurd image to collapse the distance between state force and civilian life.
What Is Included
- Original Shepard Fairey My Florist Is a Dick offset lithograph, Damaged Stencil Series, 2017
- Hand-signed in pencil by Shepard Fairey
- Hand-numbered from an edition of 400 in pencil — verify specific number (XX/400) before listing
- Single-color black offset on cream Speckletone paper — unframed, stored flat
- Gauntlet Gallery digital provenance documentation
Shipping & Handling
Professional packing. Full insurance. UPS delivery.
Shipped via UPS in a rigid flat-pack mailer with acid-free tissue interleaving, cardboard backing boards, and foam corner protection. Full insurance included. Tracking provided on all orders.
Domestic (USA): UPS Ground or UPS 2-Day — typically 3–7 business days.
International: UPS International — message us for a quote before purchasing. International buyers are responsible for local duties and VAT.
Every print leaves us in the same condition it arrived. Zero damage record.
Build the Complete Set — More Damaged Stencil Series at Gauntlet Gallery
We currently have multiple prints from the 2017 Damaged Stencil Series available, including Natural Springs, Peace Guard 2, and Proud Parents. If you're assembling the complete 8-print set, buying multiple prints from one seller means one shipping charge and one trusted source. We also carry a broader selection of Shepard Fairey prints across all eras, Banksy, Death NYC, and signed music collectibles. Add us to your Saved Sellers.
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Originally an art gallery in San Francisco, Gauntlet Gauntlet was built at the intersection of street culture, historic moments, and disciplined collecting. Rooted in the ethos of underground art movements — skate, punk, protest graphics, and independent publishing — we curate pieces that carry both cultural weight and market structure. This time bringing these items to the world after our technical in reinvention.
Our focus spans limited edition fine art, street art pioneers, music and space memorabilia, and historically significant signed works. Every item is selected for scarcity, authenticity, and long-term relevance — not short-term hype.
From museum-collected artists and politically iconic prints to astronaut autographs and era-defining music signatures, Global Gauntlet exists to preserve cultural milestones and help collectors acquire them with confidence.
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Every artist has a story. Every fan has a memory.
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SHEPARD FAIREY
Few contemporary artists have bridged underground culture and institutional recognition as effectively as Shepard Fairey. Emerging from skate and punk subcultures with the original Obey Giant campaign, he built a visual language rooted in propaganda aesthetics, bold iconography, and political commentary.
What makes Fairey compelling for collectors isn’t just name recognition — it’s durability. His work sits at the intersection of activism, design, and pop culture. \
From the globally recognized Hope poster to decades of tightly controlled screenprint editions, he has demonstrated both cultural relevance and disciplined market structure.
Institutional validation from MoMA, the Smithsonian, and the V&A reinforces long-term credibility. Meanwhile, secondary market data shows consistent liquidity and steady appreciation across core prints.
For collectors, this is cultural equity with infrastructure behind it — not trend-driven volatility.
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