Why are there billboards with giant pictures of natural landscapes next to the roads in Columbus, Georgia? That question, it turns out, is part of the point in this weird art project to advertise environmental apocalypse.
According to the artists:
As the images that appear on the billboards are all unfamiliar landscapes they provide a disjuncture that is both pleasant and disorienting for the viewer. The artists hope that viewers will wonder at what the images are and mean and wonder what they are doing in the place of advertisements and through that wonder come to a greater appreciation, however unconscious, of their own environment and it’s relationship to the world as a whole. There is an additional irony that these images, which arguably take as their subject the impacts of unregulated and unfettered commercial activity invade the commercial space which is such a part of everybody’s waking life. [Here are the images and where they were placed:]
Linwood Blvd.
Glacial, Icecap and Permafrost Melting XXXVI: Bellingshausen Base, King George Island, Antarctica, 2008
Veterans Parkway
Glacial, Icecap and Permafrost Melting XXXVIII: Antarctica, 2008
Victory Drive
Drought and Fires XIV, Umatilla National Forest, Washington State 2006
Manchester X-press Way
Glacial, Icecap and Permafrost Melting XLVII: Cordillera Blanca, Peru, 2008
Warm Springs Road (with Exhibit Announcement)
Drought and Fires XIV: Gansu Province, China, 2007
