Media giant Clear Channel doesn’t only own hundreds of broadcast stations, news networks, concert halls, entertainment venues, and promotions companies. It also owns one large part of the media landscape that is difficult to escape: billboards. Clear Channel Outdoor reportedly controls more than 700,000 display spaces, in 37 different countries. This includes billboards, taxi cab ads, bus stop benches, mall kiosks, and airport walls. And recently Clear Channel made it clear that no price was high enough to put a message critical of the war in Times Square. The non-partisan Project Billboard took Clear Channel to court, and eventually settled on what Clear Channel determined was a less offensive image.

The people behind Project Billboard obviously were at an advantage, having both the funds to rent the space in Times Square and also to go to court. How are smaller groups and organizations supposed to fight this type of censorship when trying to get their messages out?

Well, a group of creative community activists in Indiana have a solution. Your Art Here (YAH) developed a billboard project as another venue for local artists. The group founded three community-run-artist-billboards in Bloomington and Indianapolis. They’ve also exhibited on many privately owned buildings, and on commercial for-rent billboards.

Check out YAH’s latest, the Patriotic Art Series to see how they’re circumventing the likes of Lamar and Clear Channel with their provocative statements about George W.

–Catherine, Media Section Editor

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 27th, 2004 at 9:25 am by Keith. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.