Who Do You Want To Be?

Meet Mr Brainwash, the famous artist that you think you’d know.

- Josh Sims

Nothing makes sense about Thierry Guetta. Born in 1966, he’s the street artist who can seem like a parody—those sunglasses, that fedora, the heavy French accent, the permanently paint-splashed clothes—but whose works sell for many tens of thousands of US dollars a pop. He’s the relative newbie—only making his breakthrough a decade ago— who does charity events with Michelle Obama and the Pope. He’s the 21st-century pop cultural figure who, on the side, designs album covers for pop-cultural figures the likes of Madonna and the late Michael Jackson.

And on it goes. He’s the artist who decries the art system, yet parlays his art world status into lucrative gigs for the likes of Nike and Mercedes, who was invited to design the Coca-Cola’s centenary celebration for its iconic Times Square hoarding, and who brushes everything he does with a seemingly genuine varnish of peace, love and goodwill to all men. He’s the artist you may not have heard of who, any month now, will open a museum of his work in a Richard Meier-designed building on Beverly Drive in Los Angeles, where he lives.