Ron English - The Art of the Prank

Author: Ron English

Ron English, a New York-based painter, has exhibited in galleries and museums worldwide for over twenty years his unique sensibility, in which the familiar is reflected through funhouse mirrors into something startlingly new. Recently his commentary and art were featured in the hit movie \"Supersize Me,\" widening his audience beyond the boundaries of intrepid art seekers, and he has appeared on television in the US, Canada, Europe, and Japan. He is also the subject of an award-winning documentary, \"POPaganda, the Art and Crimes of Ron English.\" Most recently Ron has exhibited in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Amsterdam, where he created a series of paintings and billboards addressing the recent controversy surrounding the assassination of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh by Muslim extremists. He has also found time to delve into toy making, with a newly released series of vinyl figures, including MC Supersized, Ronnnie Rabbbit, Big Yang and the Yangbangers, and Cathy Cowgirl. In addition to painting, Ron English is widely considered to be one of the seminal figures in the culture jamming movement, in which artists and activists subvert existing advertisements to encourage free thought. He has pirated more than a thousand billboards over the last twenty years, replacing existing advertisements with his own "subvertisements," ranging from his \"Cancer Kids" campaign featuring preadolescent camels hawking cigarettes to children, to Apple computer's "Think Different" campaign, where Ron added such 20th Century luminaries as Charles Manson to Apple\"™s roster of spokesmen. Most recently Ron staged an elaborate \"tribute\" to Ronald McDonald in San Francisco, in collaboration with the Billboard Liberation Front, featuring animatronic sculpture, billboard art and the spontaneous performance of fifty-odd Ronalds, Hamburglars, and assorted clowns. In July of 2006, Ron premiered his 12 x 27-foot interpretation of \"Guernica,\" which is one foot longer and one foot taller than Picasso\"™s original, featuring a psychodrama acted out by his children, and viewed from the point of view of the bomber airplane. In 2007 the artist celebrates the 70th anniversary of Guernica with an series of billboard installations in Spain depicting modern variations of Picasso\"™s classic painting.

The Billboard:

Most billboards are wheat-pasted posters, coming in two standard sizes, the most common being 12 x 22 feet. These are the billboards you see atop taller buildings and along the highway. The freestanding billboard of this size can be accessed with a 12 foot ladder. To access the ones atop buildings, you need Continue reading “Instructions for Billboard Liberation”