Why is André Saraiva Putting Up Fake Daft Punk and Kanye West Posters in Paris, New York, and Los Angeles?

It looks like the street artist/entrepreneur has people fooled.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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Andre Saraiva is an established graffiti artist, entrepreneur, and creative director (L'Officiel Hommes magazine, currently) who tags his "Mr. A" character and started the infamous nightclub, Le Baron. He's known for making noise and attracting attention to his various endeavors, and his latest pink poster project has set a new standard for his abilities to do so.

In early May, he teased the new pink print series on Instagram with "coming soon..." A few days later, he shared a "work in progress," which showed posters advertising a concert at Bowery Ballroom with the Talking Heads and Gang Gang Dance. Soon after, he shared images of other posters on the streets of L.A. and Paris, all with line-ups that were too good to be true, because, well, they aren't.

Especially during the heightened excitement over Daft Punk's new album, Random Access Memories, the Paris version of the poster, featuring Daft Punk, Phoenix, Air, Justice, Cassius, and Kavinksy, illicited some wishful thinking on the part of fans who saw it. As DoAndroidsDance pointed out, Kavinsky tweeted that it "isn't a party, it's art," which makes sense given the fact that the venue, L'Elysee Montmartre, burned down in 2011.

The New York version of the poster (above), featuring Dr. Dre, Jay-Z, Pharrell Williams, Frank Ocean, Kanye West, Eminem, A$AP Rocky, and Andre 3000 at Madison Square Garden has people especially stirred because Pharrell's name is spelled with one less "l," Pennsylvania is spelled without the "i," Tuesday is misspelled as "Thuesday," and the order of the line-up seems unrealistic. Again, given the release of Kanye's Yeezus album on Tuesday, June 18, the timing is not only perfect, but causing people to hope and imagine that the show could be real, despite the posters' obvious flaws.

It's unclear why Andre Saraiva is both making and putting up these posters, but the reaction to them is a definite reflection of how rumors are generated and believed, especially within the music community. When hype over an album release or concert reaches astronomical levels, people can and do choose to believe any sensational detail they overhear. The pink prints also aesthetically imitate a classic form of street posters and perhaps intentionally pay tribute to this form of messaging.

Whether or not Andre shares the reasons behind this global art project soon, there's a lot one can learn from the way he interprets the connections between communication, news, and music in the pink prints series. Hopefully there aren't too many fans lining up outside these venues for the shows he's made up.

RELATED: Kanye West and DONDA Put Up Yeezus "Please Add Graffiti" Posters on the Streets of NYC

[via BrooklynVegan / DoAndroidsDance

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