CHUCK CLOSE & KEHINDE WILEY: ART ADDS 2
Press Release
For a second consecutive year, Show Media is collaborating with Art Production Fund to bring public art to NYC. Throughout the month of January, 500 taxi tops donated by Show Media will display art instead of ads. Art Adds 2011 - a city wide, one month, public art campaign - features work by CHUCK CLOSE and KEHINDE WILEY. Following last year’s series, the project will once again transform a platform normally used for commerce into one for culture, uniting separate entities into one roving exhibit.
Each artist will have approximately 250 taxis for their work. The taxis will display images on the two sides of the rooftop advertising cones. At any given time, the dynamics of the project will be different; an exhibit constantly in flux, transforming with traffic patterns throughout the day. In a city where images call out from everywhere, this is an opportunity to see and connect to the message and magic of art.
The ART ADDS taxis will be seen by over 5 million New Yorkers each day of the campaign, and on constant display 24/7, they will reach people of all ages, races, and backgrounds.
Chuck Close is an American artist internationally recognized for redefining modern portraiture and re-establishing the human face as a compelling subject for contemporary art. He first gained fame over four decades ago for his photorealistic paintings of fellow artists, family members, and friends. Throughout his career, Close has explored various methods of creation, including painting, print-making, and photography, particularly large-format Polaroids and Daguerreotypes.
Kehinde Wiley, a New York based painter from Los Angeles, is widely known for juxtaposing contemporary and traditional art influences in his work. By depicting men from a variety of cultures and nationalities in decorative French Rococo, posing in the powerful, spiritual manner of Renaissance masters such as Titan, he highlights the prejudices and idiosyncrasies of our past and poses questions for our present.
Art Production Fund (APF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to producing ambitious public art projects, reaching new audiences and expanding awareness through contemporary art. Projects include: SHOW, Vanessa Beecroft, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1998; FISCHERSPOONER: LA, performance, 2001; Keith + Farrah, collaborative exhibition by Keith Edmier and Farrah Fawcett, Los Angeles County Museum of Art and The Andy Warhol Museum, 2003; PLAN B, Rudolf Stingel summer 2004, Grand Central's Vanderbilt Hall and The Walker Art Center; Prada Marfa, Elmgreen & Dragset, Valentine, TX, 2005, permanent; Greeting Card, Aaron Young, Park Avenue Armory, 2007; Electric Fountain, Noble & Webster, Rockefeller Plaza, 2008; The Whitney Biennial, Park Avenue Armory, 2008. Kalup Linzy, Member's Only, Prospect. 1 New Orleans, 2008. Scribble, Karl Haendel, 2009; Kalup Linzy, Kembra Pfahler, Haim Steinbach, Proenza Schouler for Pitti W, Florence, Italy 2009; ART ADDS, Alex Katz, Shirin Neshat, Yoko Ono, New York City, 2010; PAUSE, Yoko Ono and T.J. Wilcox, Cosmopolitan, Las Vegas, NV, ongoing; White Ghost, Yoshitomo Nara, Park Avenue, NYC, 2010; Rob Pruitt: Holy Crap, Sotheby’s, New York City, 2010.
Show Media is the fastest growing out-of-home media company in the United States and was recently named by Inc. magazine as one of the Inc. 500 fastest growing independent companies of 2009. Show Media was co-founded in 2006 by entrepreneurs Laurence Hallier, and John Amato with a goal to help brands connect with consumers in unique and different ways. Show Media is known as an innovator in the industry and helps many of the country’s best known brands break through the clutter with their advertising including Ray-Ban, Louis Vuitton and Microsoft’s Bing.com. Headquartered in Las Vegas, Show Media has operations in New York, NY and Los Angeles, CA.
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