Jean M. Judd's work featured on an electronic bulletin board in Utica, Michigan

Textile artist Jean M. Judd of Cushing, Wisconsin will have six of her textile artworks featured on an electronic bulletin board in Utica, Michigan, which is a suburb of Detroit. The Billboard Art Project is a special project started in 2010 to feature artists’ work on electronic billboards in select cities across the USA.

Artworks by Ms. Judd to be featured on the billboard from May 28 to June 24, 2012 on the Detroit billboard include: Contaminated Water #1, Contaminated Water #2: Pond Scum, Contaminated Water #3: Sludge, Scribble #1: Dream Weaver, Sound Waves #1 and Sound Waves #2: White Noise.

Scribble #1: Dream Weaver

The billboard is west facing and traffic traveling east bound on Hall Rd (M-59)can seen it. Viewers can sit and watch the show from the parking lot shared by Muldoon's Restaurant at 7636 Auburn Road and the Utica Fire and Police Department. The images will change on the billboard every 6 to 10 seconds depending on the local regulations of department of motor vehicles.

A few days before the exhibition starts on the electronic billboard, the names of the featured artists and their web sites will be available on line at this web site: http://billboardartproject.org/cities/detroit.html

The Billboard Art Project is a nonprofit organization that acquires digital billboards normally used for advertising and repurposes them as roadside galleries. cities all over the country feature the projects, which are open to all individuals and groups who are interested in participating.

It was in 2005 that David Morrison came up with the idea of displaying artwork on electronic bulletin boards. Lamar Advertising tested the first LED billboard in Richmond, Virginia. Mr. Morrison’s first Billboard Art Project came to fruition in early October of 2010 with a 24-hour art display.

“The original idea was a bit of a lark. I was going to have them run several hundred random images and phrases having nothing to do with advertising as a sort of gift to all the drivers weary of the white noise that is advertising. The idea also had the added benefit of being a sort of social experiment. How would people respond? What would they think? The project became a great internal conversation piece that I would mull over to help me escape the mundane everyday tasks life sometimes requires,” Morrison explains.

“When it was all said and done, the Richmond, Virginia Billboard Art Project had over thirty participants who submitted images covering a diverse range of things. Some were serious, and some were outright comical. There were sketches, illustrations, photographs, and clipart. The sequential submissions engaged viewers like flash cards. One of the artists even put up the sayings and lucky numbers from fortune cookies she had collected over the years,” relates Morrison of that first billboard art project.

Types of work that may be displayed include images created specifically for the billboard as well as images of previously made art adapted to the format. No two Billboard Art Project shows are alike; each city features new work. The featured artwork comes from national and international artists, so it is really a showing of artwork from across the globe.

The slate of cities so far for 2012 include: Richmond, VA; Salem, OR; Detroit Metro; Albany, NY; Quincy, IL; and Atlanta, GA. The first full year of the Billboard Art Project (2011) was in the following cities: Nashville, TN; Savannah, GA; Duluth, MN; Reading, PA; Chicago, IL; Baton Rouge, LA; New Orleans, LA; and San Bernardino, CA. These displays of art ranged from 24 hours to almost a month in duration.