Monday, May 4th, 2009 ::: USA: New York City

Today’s post is by Carolyn Tripp.

Jordan Seiler of Illegalsigns.ca’s American comrade, PublicAdCampaign.com, has pulled together one of the largest organized guerilla art campaigns against illegal billboards in recent memory (perhaps ever). Doing all North American cities proud, Seiler along with over 40 other participants white-washed illegal billboards across the city, and followed quickly by creating artwork, messages, and general visually-stimulating fare in order to to take back the public space — space that companies, namely NPA Outdoor, had obtained and utilized with complete disregard to the city’s bylaws, resulting in excessively cluttered streets.

Art from Ji Lee, Tristan Eaton, Gaia and Rachel , Aakash Nihilani, Maya Hayuk, MOMO, and I AM was featured among the myriad of work south of 30th Street in Manhattan. In the midst of artist charges and show documentation, Seiler took a moment out of his busy schedule to answer our legal and art queries.

Carolyn Tripp: PublicAdCampaign.com tracks graffiti, art, and legal issues surrounding the American advertising heavyweights. Basically anything that’s affecting the public eye when it comes to 2D visual culture. How often have companies gone after you and your colleagues for calling out illegal billboards?

Jordan Seiler: Knock on wood, but never. There are plenty of people who watch the site and comment disparagingly, and I’ve had a few run-ins with the city, but nothing serious. A company responsible for garbage can advertisements in NYC once threatened to sue the Scope Art Fair after I took over 90+ advertisements in the Times Square area as a participant in the 3 day art exhibition. Scope simply removed me from the fair, sent me on my way, and that was that. But truth be told, my work has been much smaller scale than the most recent event, of which I was only a participant. The NYSAT project did create 4 arrests, all which were brought on by an NPA owner/employee that was riding around the city calling the cops on participants. I’m not even sure what he was doing was legal. We’re certainly looking into getting the charges dropped on the three remaining participants who are still facing charges.

I honestly did think NPA City Outdoor was going to sue me, but a week after the event I still have not heard from them. I believe they know they can’t win, and are therefore better off moving past this as fast as possible in hopes that the problem will go away. I assure you it will not.

CT: The most recent calling out has been very affecting, visually. Can you speak a bit about the process regarding the initial idea, call for proposals, and maintaining discretion?

JS: This idea has been rolling around for a while and it developed through talks with people like Steve Lambert and Poster Boy. Basically a realization was made that this entire company, NPA City Outdoor, was operating without permits. This presented a unique position for us to strike as concerned citizens as opposed to the vigilante public renegades upset with current abuses of the public environment by all outdoor advertising (which by the way, we actually are). Add to this the fact that these locations were all operating at street level, accessible to both whitewashers and artists without any special tools or equipment, and the project basically had to happen.

A call for participants was made many months before the project took place to gauge interest, and with about 40 volunteers we decided to set a date. From that point on I operated on my faith in those who had promised me they would participate over email, and the numbers grew steadily. Discretion was kept by everyone involved, relying on an e-mail which was to be disseminated with extreme caution. The top of the email read: This email communication is confidential and not to be distributed to unintended parties. Please exercise extreme caution when distributing this information to any party with whom you are not personally affiliated.

The first portion of the project involved mapping and identifying all NPA City Outdoor locations below 30th street in Manhattan. From that point on, planning the project involved creating as tight a schedule as possible for the whitewashers so that they would be on the street as short a time as possible. I also spent quite a while putting together their alibis, outfits, mobile whitewashing units, and letters from fake agencies like the Municipal Landscape Control Committee, so that they appeared as official as possible. Planning was extremely detailed to say the least.

CT: While artists like Poster Boy have maintained hidden identities to reconstruct public advertising, you (and several of the participants) have made yourself visible for this campaign. Did you ever consider using an alias to avoid the hot water?

JS: I’m very glad you asked this question, as I was about to post something about this on my site. It’s very important. The choice to not use an alias was one I made a long time ago when I began to do this type of work. It’s a choice I’m very happy to see some of the participants make as well.

Basically my thoughts on this are that as a resident and public citizen of the City of New York, I am entitled to make marks on my environment in some way, shape, or form. This does not mean the wanton destruction of every surface of our city with the scrawl of every thought that pops into our collective head, but it does mean that there is a need to visually communicate with each other that isn’t being met.

By interacting with your public environment, communicating, or altering it in some way, individuals create a sense of investment in that space. The result of this investment in the space, the space in which you live, is rooted in a desire to care for that area. For me, visually interacting with public space has a direct correlation with public concern.

Personally I think that outdoor advertising is one of the forces preventing the public from being allowed to interact visually with its shared public environment. This is caused by a few things, not the least important of which is the fact that outdoor advertising gives monetary value to what should be our shared public walls.

By putting a price on our shared environment, you prevent those that cannot afford to purchase that space from using their public environment to communicate. I think it is my duty as a citizen to call out advertising for its abuse of our public spaces, both mental and physical.

If I decide to hide behind an alias, I am admitting that interacting visually with our public environment to be a crime, and it’s not. It’s only being perpetrated as one, and by using my real name I intend to cause people to think about this discrepancy.

CT: And lastly, what were your parameters in regards to artist selection?

JS: This is one of the great misnomers of this project. Many participants, including those that went back to create public messages on these newly whitewashed boards, were not artists at all. More than being about art, this project was about public participation in the visual construction of their shared environment. We had software engineers, bio-physicists, architects, sports writers, and general deviants out for a good cause, participating as much as we did “artists.” This project was open to anyone.

You can read Seiler’s blog at PublicAdCampaign.com