This HPM (Hand-Painted Multiple) by Shepard Fairey constructs the image as a label—and, in doing so, as a condensed model of propaganda itself: an iconic profile enclosed within a circular medallion, frames and hatchings that mimic engraving, and above all the inscription “PROPAGANDA RECORDS,” which forms the conceptual core of the work. Here, “records” is not a mere musical reference; it signifies the very idea of a channel—recording, pressing, multiplying, distributing—and thus becomes a perfect metaphor for propaganda, which only exists once a message becomes reproducible and widely disseminated. Fairey overlays two systems of circulation—the record and the slogan—to remind us that images, like sound, can become instruments of persuasion as soon as they are transformed into serial products. It is precisely this tension—between seductive icon and mechanism of diffusion—that gives the work its power.
