Shepard Fairey Art Project Channels Celebs For Gay Marriage Equality

Several celebrities are teaming up for an art project and auction to benefit gay marriage equality. They are lending their signatures and creative voices to artist Shepard Fairey’s now iconic DEFEND EQUALITY LOVE UNITES poster, which has become a symbol of marriage equality.

The split-screen image, seen here, features “Heroes’” Milo Ventimiglia’s poster on the right, and a poster with the signatures of Julia Roberts, Bradley Cooper, Jason Biggs, Jane Fonda, Pierce Brosnan, Jessica Biel, Robin Wright Penn, Meagan Good, Carey Mulligan, and Ashley Tisdale, on the left.

On November 12 2009, FAIR, an LGBT grassroots organization, and artist Shepard Fairey will debut a select group of these celebrity-customized original screen prints during an event taking place at the Andaz hotel in West Hollywood. The prints are a part of a marriage equality project undertaken by FAIR to help give a platform to nearly 100 celebrity voices in support of marriage equality.

The launch event is being held in partnership with entertainment networking group HOMOtracker and its annual fundraiser ‘FallOut.’ Fairey will attend and serve as DJ for a portion of the evening.

The event will also launch an auction of the signed and customized prints on the charity auction Web site charitybuzz.com. Proceeds raised from the online auction, lasting from November 10 to December 9, will directly benefit the grassroots organizations fighting for marriage equality in California and across the country. A selection of the customized original screen prints, custom-framed courtesy of Allen Jeffries Framing, will be on display throughout the Andaz ballroom and pool deck. The Andaz West Hollywood is also a significant partner and sponsor of the event.

Other celebs who have designed posters include: Scarlett Johansson, Natalie Portman, Virginia Madsen, Ellen Degeneres & Portia De Rossi, Robert De Niro, Taylor Kitsch, Michael C Hall, Russell Simmons, Dave Matthews, Jared Leto, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, designer Marc Jacobs, Bruce Vilanch, Martina Navratilova, Anna Kendrick, Cheyenne Jackson, Sarah Silverman, Anne Hathaway, Rupaul, Kim Kardashian, Kirsten Dunst, Lynda Carter, Lance Bass, Charlie Sheen, Benjamin Bratt, Chris Evans, Melissa Etheridge & Tammy Lynn Michaels, New Kids On The Block, Tegan & Sara, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Calvin Klein, Chelsea Handler, Darryl Stephens and Chris Pine.

In November of 2008, after the passage of Proposition 8 in California, artist and civil rights advocate Shepard Fairey, whose Obama HOPE print became an iconic centerpiece of the President’s visual campaign, was approached by grassroots marriage equality organization FAIR to commission an image to help unite and inspire the movement. The result was the creation of the DEFEND EQUALITY LOVE UNITES image. Shepard Fairey’s ‘Obey: Supply and Demand’ show at the Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, PA, opens October 17.