"Most Wanted" Celebrity Portraits by Richard Phillips

  Kristen Steward:
 “I think the easiest one right off the bat was Kristen because of her relationship with Pattinson; plus, New Moon and Twilight were such a success"

   Today everybody is obsessed with celebrities - they are literally everywhere: on the TV, on billboards, in magazines. That cultural phenomenon inspired the hyper-realist artist Richard Phillips to create a collection of 10 portraits depicting some of the currently most popular stars.
   The"Most Wanted" exhibition, displayed in the White Cube in London, features the Twilight pair Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson, their co-worker Dakota Fanning, Leonardo Dicaprio, Zac Efron, Justin Timberlake, Gossip Girl stars Taylor Momsen and Chace Crawford along with singers Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift.
   Painted on a backdrop of luxury fashion logos such as Versace and Gucci, the exhibition sets out to show the relationship between celebrity, fashion and its audience.

 Dakota Fanning: 

"She has a very innocent look and should be the one you feel the most relaxed with because of the feelings she evokes. But the Dakota Fanning image scares me the most.”

   
Here is what the painter himself revealed about his artwork:
   "The Most Wanted exhibition conveys the irreducible condition that our notion of contemporary culture has reached, where all forms of artistic endeavour must submit to the dominant presence of celebrity endorsement and luxury brand legitimisation through sponsorship in order to sustain and safeguard its existence. 
   The large-scale, traditionally-painted portraits of the stars set against fashion logo step-and-repeat backdrops form an uncannily humanised version of this primary economic realism.”

Jump in to see the rest.