Imagine you're driving down Route 66, shopping the Mall of America or strolling through Times Square, and instead of seeing an ad for the next iPhone plastered on a mega screen or highway billboard, you see this painting by Roy Lichtenstein (below):
This summer, 500,000 billboards and screens normally devoted to advertising products will be replaced with works of American art.
The project, called Art Everywhere US, is being forefronted by the top art museums in the nation -- the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
It was inspired by a similar project executed in the United Kingdom last summer. The idea is to expose people who may not frequent museums to the art of their country. According to National Endowment for the Arts, only about 21% of American adults have been to a gallery or museum in the past year.
Miranda Carroll, the director of communications for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, said, “It’s putting art out there for the public to see in an unusual way--not necessarily to make people want to come to museums, but to let them see something that might be inspiring or beautiful or thought-provoking,” in an interview with factcoexist.com.
The five museums each submitted 20 works of art, from which 50 will be chosen after a public vote found here (public voting has already been concluded, but visitors can still view the contestants).
The event, when executed, will be the world's largest outdoor art gallery to date.
