Search Results for 'takeover'

Madrid Street Advertising Takeover

Published on April 1, 2011 in activism, mass transit and street art by Charlie Todd. Closed Tags: , , , , .

Public Ad Campaign strikes again with a new advertising takeover. This one took over 106 bus shelter ads in Madrid. Artists around the world were asked to submit text for the billboards. The above photo shows text I personally submitted. It translates to: “advertisement for a bad movie.” Check out all the other photos and artists here.

Here’s the project summary:

MaSAT (Madrid Street Advertising Takeover) is the second international street ad takeover project, and the third in a series of civil disobedience projects intent on changing our expectations of public behavior in our shared environments. For this SAT project we targeted Cemusa bus shelters in 4 heavily populated locations around Madrid. This time, at the request of our Madrid based collaborators, participants were asked to submit only text based works. This fantastic idea allowed us to open up the submission request process to a wide range of individuals including sociologist, teachers, lawyers, gallery owners and anyone with a concern for the curation and participation in public space. Each of the 106 individuals were asked to submit one sentiment they wished to see exhibited on the streets. The result is a variety of unique visions of public dialogue and a glimpse at the possibilities available when we open up our public environment in a truly public way.

On Corporate Graffiti

Published on August 30, 2010 in activism and street art by Charlie Todd. Closed Tags: , , , .

We’ve covered the New York Street Advertising Takeover quite a few times on this site, but we wanted to share this new short documentary by Sarah Berman. It does a great job of telling the story of the project and the positive impact it had on our streets.

In related news, the first Toronto Street Advertising Takeover recently took place.

New Video of the NYSAT

Published on October 16, 2009 in activism and street art by Charlie Todd. 1 Comment Tags: , , , .

We’ve already covered the Public Ad Campaign‘s New York Street Advertising Takeover a few times, but this new HD video by Keith Haskel is worth taking a look at, even if you’re already familiar with the project.

Calling Bullshit on Illegal Ads

Published on August 10, 2009 in activism, marketing and street art by Charlie Todd. 21 Comments Tags: , , , .

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Here’s the deal: There’s a company called National Public Advertising Outdoor that puts up advertisements on sides of buildings and other public places in New York and other big cities. The ads they put up are illegal. They do not have a permit. They city is not getting paid. Instead, they pay the landlords of the buildings they use. Citizens are forced to look at advertising all over NYC because this company has illegally plastered their ads all over town. For whatever reason, the city looks the other way and rarely cracks down on them.

This spring, Jordan from The Public Ad Campaign blog organized a massive grassroots retaliation against the illegal billboards. See our coverage here and here. In short, an army of artists whitewashed 120 different illegal billboards and replaced them with art. NPA Outdoor was furious and sent out teams to put their ads back up in a matter of hours. A few artists even got arrested after being caught in the act by police.

Since the takeover, NPA Outdoor has added a new notice to all of their billboard sites. As you can see in the photo above, it reads, “Coming soon to this location: a chance to win these posters and other prizes inside.” They are trying to find a loophole in their bullshit illegal business. It’s illegal for a landlord to put an advertisement on the side of his building, but it’s not illegal to put up a sign advertising products that are for sale inside. So by putting up this bullshit notice that claims you can win the posters inside the store, NPA is trying to get around the law. They’re smart to add the phrase “coming soon,” because if you go in ANY of the stores that have this notice, you’ll find that there are no posters. It’s all bullshit. I’ve personally asked people in a half-dozen stores for more information on “winning” the posters and every clerk has looked at me like I was an idiot. They had no idea what I was talking about, because there is no drawing for posters. It’s bullshit.

Recently Posterchild and Jason Eppink set out to call NPA Outdoor on their bullshit. The duo replaced NPA’s notice with one of their own.

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Why won’t the city crack down on New York’s true graffiti problem?

New York Street Advertising Takeover Videos

Published on May 11, 2009 in activism by Charlie Todd. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

Tons of documentation is coming in from last month’s incredible New York Street Advertising Takeover, where hoards of artists and every day people came together to reclaim the streets by covering over 120 of New York’s illegal billboards with art. The project was organized by the Public Ad Campaign. Check out these three videos from the project:


via Rocketboom


video by Jason Eppink; art by Posterchild and I AM


via Barbara Celis

New York Street Advertising Takeover

Published on April 27, 2009 in activism and street art by Charlie Todd. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , .

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artist – Ji Lee

This past Saturday over 120 illegal billboards were white-washed and covered with art in New York City by a team of volunteers and artists. The guerrilla operation was organized by The Public Ad Campaign over the past four months.

Barbara Celis writes:

As the main organizer explained to the artists who choose to get involved, the agency that owns the ‘attacked’ billboards operates on an illegal basis. “NPA outdoor operates over 500 street level billboards in NYC ranging in size from about 4′x4′ to 50′x12′. All of these advertising structures are illegal. I found this out by talking to the NYC Department of Buildings which has no permits for the NPA outdoor structures but has its hands full dealing with the rampant illegal billboard situation. I have also spoken directly with NPA outdoor employees who have told me that the NYPD will jail them from time to time at which point NPA lawyers bail them out and they are compensated 500 dollars for the nuisance of spending the night in jail”.

NPA Outdoor had teams putting their illegal advertising back up early Sunday morning. I personally spotted ads going up over artwork on 8th Avenue and 26th Street at 2 AM. Celis interviewed an artist at the afterparty who said, “Art is about the experience, about living the moment, and what we did was so fucking great for New York that even if they take down our pieces, we have learned that we can do it, and we will do it again. New yorkers had fun today in a very unusual way. It’s priceless!”

More photos:
cronicasbarbaras
wooster collective
gothamist