Desire Obtain Cherish recently started a new campaign of anti-billboard pieces using the slogan “Is This Illegal?” which points out that LA is overrun with unlicensed advertising and that street artists who go over billboards can face felony charges even though the billboards themselves are often illegal to begin with. So far, the group has hit up at least one full-sized billboard and some street-level advertising.
When watching this video of their billboard takeover, please ignore the general cheesiness of the video, as the text at the end is actually quite informative:
Benjamin Alejandro has also used the “Is This Illegal?” slogan in a takeover featuring his own work:
Once the issue of the mural moratorium in LA is more or less fixed (should be soon), maybe “Is This Illegal?” will become the new slogan of LA’s outdoor art community and the disruption of illegal advertising will become their new political cause. One can dream…
Photo by Birdman Photos
Via PublicAdCampaign and Melrose&Fairfax