Artists Strike Back! The New York Street Advertising Takeover (NYSAT)/Municipal Landscape Control Committee (Groundswell)

Last Saturday’s events were big news – this summary comes from Groundswell Collective:

PublicAdCampaign.com‘s Jordan Seiler recounted the events of April 25th, 2009, with just a few words: “Something happened yesterday, an eye for an eye”

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The New York Street Advertising Takeover (NYSAT) organized approximately 80 artists and other participants to whitewash 120 billboards that operate illegally in New York, which they used as canvasses. Attached to each billboard was a fake warning note, shown here, that declared NYC’s Department of Buildings had deemed the billboards illegal, and scheduled the whitewashing. Real Municipal Landscape Control Committee contacts were used.

Four arrests followed from this act of civil disobedience cum vigilante justice: 2 whitewashers, one artist, and one videographer. The charges of criminal mischief, which the DA has since reduced to disorderly conduct, are being challenged.

Barbara Celis, a journalist that writes for the Spanish language newspaper El Pais, broke the story, and has posted details that the Posterboy and Enjoy Banking crews were involved, with many pictures from the action.

To summarize, Seiler again:

More than about art, this project was about public participation in the visual construction of their shared environment.

via Groundswell Collective