Can ?artistic thinking? and crowdfunded billboards boost voter turnout" For Freedoms says yes. New billboards rarely disrupt routines. But when one appeared near Interstate 69 in Lansing, Michigan, on October 1, something was different. Local newspapers and the billboard company began receiving calls from frightened passersby concerned about the white Arabic script set against a black backdrop. All it says is ?Human Being.? It?s the work Jamila El Sahili, one of over 150 artists who created billboards for the 50 State Initiative, a civic engagement project from For Freedoms, the ?collective for creative citizenship? that wants to get people thinking and, most importantly, voting.
This month cryptic billboards like El Sahili?s have appeared in all 50 states bearing messages like ?Never Again Is Now? set against a photograph of a Japanese internment camp; ?An Expensive Hoax? against a storm-ravaged landscape; and ?Be Strong And Do Not Betray Your Soul? layered over an image of a freeway overpass. There was little fanfare for the billboards? arrival, and zero context other than a ?Paid for by For Freedoms? insignia. Billboards are ubiquitous parts of the landscape and are always trying to sell something. For Freedoms wondered how that medium could be used to ?sell? civic participation. ?What would happen if we co-opted this form of relatively unavoidable mass advertising in order to encourage civic engagement or political discourse"? Taylor Brock, of the 50 Sta...