Philly Artists Replace ‘Cheap’ Barbera Ads with Art to Take Back the Public Space: Announcing #TrashcanTakeover

(Photos by Streets Dept Contributor Eric Dale; artwork above by Iris Barbee Bonner, Gianni Lee, Marisa Velázquez-Rivas, and Santiago Galeas)

If you’ve been through Philly this summer, chances are good you’ve seen those endless ads for Gary Barbera Autoland selling “Cheap Jeeps.” Overnight, it seemed, the ads were on hundreds of trashcans in Center City. In June, I wrote about how bummed I was about these ads and the apparent lack of thought on the City’s part about the worth of our public spaces, not to mention that the 5% the City actually earns from these ads goes right back to maintenance of the trashcans and that Philly’s pervious City Controller Alan Butkovitz publicly stated that these high-tech trashcans are a costly waste and don’t provide the city the kinds of benefits over regular old mesh cans that we were originally promised. So today, I couldn’t be more thrilled to announce #TrashcanTakeover, a temporary art intervention that’s replacing 18 Center City trashcan ads with art from local artists!

#TrashcanTakeover is the brainchild of Brendan Lowry (of @Peopledelphia fame) via his creative consultancy, Rory Creative. It’s being funded by the folks at City Fitness to pay the artists for the use of their artwork and to buy the ad space. And because of my advocacy against the Barbera ads, I’m not only joining the project as one of the artists but also as collaborator and Media Partner to help get the word out about it and the work of these Philadelphia artists!

There’s nothing cheap about our public spaces. I believe deeply in the value of public space and that what we put there has an effect on the ways we think, feel, and behave. Replacing a number of ads around Philadelphia with art from local artists is big step in the right direction for returning the public space to the public. And it’s a growing trend in cities, following the inspiration of other such projects like the #YeahWeGotKeysForThat ad takeover campaign and New York City’s Art in Ad Places. What can happen when we replace ads with art? When we use our public spaces to center less on consumerism and more on the human experience? I think these are questions worth asking.

Scroll down to see a list of all the artists and artwork involved. And check out the #TrashcanTakeover Map to explore these temporary installations for yourself. The art will be up for at least one month, through September 18, but if y’all are liking this project we may be able to secure it for longer and maybe even grow it to takeover more trashcan ads!

1) Marisa Velázquez-Rivas



2) Gianni Lee



3) Saeed Ferguson



4) Aubrie Costello



5) Santiago Galeas



6) Sheldon Abba



7) Nilé Livingston



8) Najeeb Sheikh



9) Alloyius Mcilwaine



10) Conrad Benner



11) Vi Vu



12) Amberella



13) Brendan Lowry



14) Alex Kuhn



15) Iris Barbee Bonner



16) Kelly Smith



17) Sean Martorana



18) Stefan Suchanec

