Hrag Vartanian

While I was hard on the LA Times, they pulled through and revealed the name of the creator of the Obama/Joker image but not the actual street art…let’s just say this story is complicated:

When cryptic posters portraying President Obama as the Joker from “Batman” began popping up around Los Angeles and other cities, the question many asked was, Who is behind the image?

Was it an ultra-conservative grassroots group or a disgruntled street artist going against the grain?

Nope, it turns out, just a 20-year-old college student from Chicago.

Bored during his winter school break, Firas Alkhateeb [pictured above], a senior history major at the University of Illinois, crafted the picture of Obama with the recognizable clown makeup using Adobe’s Photoshop software.

But Alkhateeb didn’t post the image on the street, that part is still a mystery:

Then the counter [of his Flickr page] exploded after a still-anonymous rogue famously found his image, digitally removed the references to Time Magazine, captioned the picture with the word “socialism” and hung printed copies around L.A., making headline.

Coincidentally, Alkhateeb is a supporter of ultra-liberal Rep. Dennis Kucinich, though he “prefers Republican ideals on domestic issues”…how these two things gel I have no idea.

Whole post here.