Archive for the ‘Submissions’ Category

Australian Billboard Liberation Sleeper Cell Strikes

Monday, September 29th, 2008

Australia before

Australia after

A small group of people from the outskirts of Sydney Australia, lead by an newly inspired billboard liberator, has recently formed with the intention to help the public question the use of advertising in public spaces.

The group’s leader, Robert Brown told us of the motivation of the group, free street art. “It is our belief that public art should not be illegal and forced to stay behind gallery doors, but it should be displayed in public spaces and used as a method to encourage people to question the society they reside and it’s morals.”

Discussing recent activity Brown stated that “After several successful postings on a local church billboard questioning their message of heaven or hell. A decision was made that a bigger audience with a larger target was required.”

When asked about the latest billboard Brown commented, “After seeing a billboard with such an open and inviting message, it was only a matter of time before we improved it.”

Why use the Prime Minister as the victim?
“The selection of the victim was a grueling process, as it was difficult to choose a person who will annoy a lot of people, while also bring great satisfaction to many others. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was used as he was currently receiving a lot of media attention for going to New York, to discuss the financial crisis. We also wanted to make it clear that our organisation will not withhold from questioning any form of society no matter how they are perceived in society.” Robert Brown.

What Moral is your work questioning?
“This particular work is of more interpretive nature, and is aimed at helping the public see the lighter side of politics, and to remove themselves from a stance of love or hate towards their country’s political leader, but a feeling of respect, which will help us to become a more tolerable country.” Brown.

Is there any future activities planned for the group?

“Yes. The group is constantly working on smaller projects, but future large scale activities will be focused on the use of billboards for alcohol advertisement, which we find quite contradictory with governmental interventions for this country’s aboriginal populations in central Australia.”

Video of the AT&T/NSA Improvement

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

courtesy of Iov de Beholther

Difibulator? Can I get fries with that?

Saturday, February 2nd, 2008

A sleeper cell in London, Ontario, Canada has sent this improvement to us. Deftly pointing out the horrors of American fast food, this from the country that created poutine.

billboard2.jpg

There press release as follows:

Last night at approximately 1:30 AM, a collective of
London activists executed a brilliant billboard
liberation at the intersection of Adelaide and Lorne,
only three blocks away from the London Police
Headquarters. They undertook a wheatpasting operation
to bring more truth to their client, ‘Wendy’s ‘Stack
Attack’ advertisement. The word ‘stack’ was changed to
‘heart’ in order to point out the serious fact that
fast food causes a massive amount of serious health
problems in our society. An immediate and dramatic
police response followed the action and within a
minute several cruisers converged on the site of the
public mind-space reclamation. Fortunately the action
was thoroughly planned out and the activists all
disappeared into the darkness of the night within
seconds. The ad-bust stayed up during both rush hours
today, January 23, 2008, and was not replaced until
later on in the evening.

Venti Vidi Vici

Monday, August 20th, 2007

starfucks.jpg
Photocredit: Paul Stamatiou

Paul Stamtiou spotted this wonderful liberation along the 101 near San Francisco. If anyone has any backstory on it, we’d love to hear more.

Call for Liberation of Tacoma

Sunday, August 5th, 2007

tacomasigns.jpg

Clear Channel, the BLF patron saint, has taken a bold stand on free speech in Tacoma Washington with their CONSTITUTIONS MATTER {sic} campaign, we here at the BLF was not aware we had more than one. We applaud CC taking a moment to not look at the bottom line and think of the little people, their clients. The City of Tacoma gave Clear Channel a mere ten years to take down billboard considered too big or too ugly, why didn’t they just stand in front of the CC headquarters and demand, “you kids get off my lawn!” A billboard too ugly, surly you jest.

Well the patriots at Clear Channel aren’t going to stand for such blant attempts the squelch their clients God Given Right(R) to promote the latest soaps and beers and in the great spirit of Thomas Paine used their billboards to demand great freedoms for the huddled masses of corporations who have but no other voice to sing the triumphs of packaged muffins. When asked about the campaign, Tacoma City Councilperson responded, “Clear Channel cares about the constitution? Who the fuck do they think they are, ATT?

The BLF thanks NW sleeper cell operatives JL Staves and RR Anderson for this vital intelligence.

We also suggest a minor copy change, the first words changed to BLIGHTS would be apros. Good luck kids.

Johnny Walker Marches Against War

Monday, June 4th, 2007

johnnywalker.jpg

Special thanks to Jeff Webb for pointing out this Liberation at 14th and Folsom in San Francisco. Wonderfully subtle, and we are such great fans of Mssr. Walker.

Bus Stop Art Installation by the Anti Adversting Agency

Friday, May 26th, 2006

Bus Stop Bench Ad Project

The Anti-Advertising Agency and Packard Jennings have wrapped up their Oakland based Bus Stop Bench Ad Project. The Agency created a survey to poll residents in the neighborhoods surrounding 10 Oakland bus stops regarding what advertising tactics they found most bothersome in their neighborhoods. Jennings then developed targeted illustrations for each neighborhood and the team installed the work.

Check out the campaign here.

Billboard Alteration Salutes U.S. Military in Iraq

Monday, April 17th, 2006

[WE DID NOT DO THIS BILLBOARD, BUT WE LOVE IT] The improvement was executed by the California Department of Corrections. {Warning: Geocities site frequently die because of traffic}

[UPDATE] The CDC Geocities site is down, but you can view their fantastic improvements here

Photo Credit: CDC
Photo credit: Unnamed CDC Operative

Press Release from the CDC:

As a private institution dedicated to protecting California from the state’s most criminal advertising, the California Department of Corrections salutes the private security firms who have provided invaluable assistance to our colleagues in the U.S. military.

The advertisement is currently at liberty and it seems to have successfully readjusted to public life. However, the billboard will remain under surveillance by department staff to prevent recidivism and any potential lapse into its prior criminal behavior.

The California Department of Corrections is a private institution dedicated to the protection of the public through the alteration, rehabilitation and improvement of California’s most criminal advertising. Initiated in 1994, the department is operated by individuals who feel that California’s correctional facilities have been insufficiently managing the state’s most criminal elements.

For additional information on department programs and operations, please visit the CDC website at www.geocities.com/billboardcorrections or email the Office of Communications at cdc [at] revolutionist.com {esp. if you want a hirez photo, cause we here at the BLF didn’t take the photo -mrk}.

Congratulations to the CDC for another excellent improvment, check out more of the CDC’s award-winning advertising

Watching the Watchers

Thursday, December 29th, 2005

I Spy a Spy
– photo credit: Ted Rheingold

San Francisco blogger and developer, Ted Rheingold spotted this excellent billboard prank corporate art. The artist (who so far remains unknown) reminds us how omnipresent surveillance has become in our everyday lives. Read Ted’s writeup and peruse his flickr photo set of the art. Special thanks to our hosting service Laughing Squid for bringing this to our attention.

The BLF stands firmly against prolific monitoring of the population, as it gets in the way of our ninja activities and highly restricts our dark artistic endeavors.

UPDATE: Looks like the art is part of a collaboration between New Langton Arts and {get this} Clear Channel called Double Take.

Transparent Billboards

Wednesday, October 19th, 2005

Kasia Kesicka, at the Academy of Fine and Applied Arts in Poznan, creates a commentary on public space in various cities in Poland for her MFA final project in Photography. The result, mirroring the transparent laptop trick, is stunning and poignant {flash}