Here’s something interesting from the UK.

A group of artists from the UK, Italy and France have embarked on a project around the UK that is called “Brandalism” which aims to “challenge the destructive impacts of the advertising industry.”

Brandalism is essentially a campaign to hijack a number of billboards around London and ‘refresh’ them with new work by 26 street artists.

These guys are not happy with the advertising industry, claiming the industry takes no responsibility for the messages they force-feed consumers and don’t give those consumers a chance to opt out from these intrusions into public and personal spaces.

The project has so far targetted outdoor campaigns by Nike, Footlocker, JD Sports and McDonald’s and Locog have been “refreshed” by the artists among others. The group has also posted anti advertising campaigns in Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol.

This is being portrayed as street art against branding when in fact it should be street art against outdoor advertising.

Outdoor advertising is an element of advertising which is an element of communications which is an element of branding.

I don’t quite understand how taking a billboard with one message and painting over with another message is going to stop the intrusive attempts by advertisers (and their clients) to get our attention.

There’s also a danger that they will become guilty of the ‘crime’ they are so against, don’t you think?

You can read more about the project here