Drake loves lots of things: good weed, white wine, a certain someone since he was 22-years-old, and billboards. In 2011, his Take Care billboard caused a bit of a scuffle with Toronto’s city officials (it also inspired some Pulitzer-grade material from the Toronto Star: “A superstar rapper and his signature owl have ruffled the feathers of the city’s legal eagles”). Two years later, he made this “Started From the Bottom” billboard Nothing Was the Same‘s album cover. At some point around this time, Mary Kate and Ashley must have linked him up with whoever helped make 1998’s best film Billboard Dad a reality, because Drake billboards are everywhere now. Two ‘6’ themed billboards appeared within a year — this one and this one — and over the past week, four separate Drake billboards have appeared. One hints at a collaboration with Kanye, one showers Rihanna with the praise she deserves, and two of them just sorta brag.
In honor of this man’s undying love for billboards, we’ve compiled a list of our favorite iconic and almost-iconic signage by artists of all kinds. Some are by fellow musicians, like The Beatles and Nicole Dollanganger; others by artists like Jenny Holzer and Yoko Ono. One of them is a giant playground, and another sprays blood on cars.
Yoko Ono: If Drake is looking for r̶e̶v̶e̶n̶g̶e̶ a collaborator, he should give the Japanese artist a call on her cell phone (or tie a wish on a tree, as that seems to be her preferred method of communication). Ono has created countless minimalist billboards, most often one or two words in black text set against a white backdrop. She’s done “Fly,” “Imagine Peace,” “Dream,” and “Earth Peace” among others. Of course her most famous public signage was “War is Over!”; created with John Lennon at the height of anti Vietnam War protests in December 1969, the billboard was installed in 12 major cities around the world.
Billboard to promote a TV screening of the film “Kill Bill, Volume 1” pic.twitter.com/RU9uojP0vW
— Harith (@harthinho) March 19, 2016
Kill Bill: In 2008, one New Zealand television channel was so excited to screen Quentin Tarantino’s gory samurai masterpiece, it commissioned advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi to create a billboard — five years after the film’s original release. The result: a fittingly bloody tribute, one in which Uma Thurman’s carnage splashed cars on the street. Like most other ideas, this one was originally conceived by The Simpsons writers. In one 1992 episode, The Itchy & Scratchy Movie was advertised with a blood splattering billboard that dumped buckets of paint on passers-by. Tarantino guest directed an episode of the hyper-violent cat and mouse chase five years later, in a 1997 Simpsons episode. You know what they say, bloody art imitates more bloody art.
Miss Piggy goes Angelyne: In the mid 80s, a woman named Angelyne became a Los Angeles legend when a large number of personal billboards began sprouting up all over Hollywood. Often regarded as the first “famous for being famous” celebrity, the billboards led to a music career, a few acting roles in films like Earth Girls are Easy, and even a gubernatorial candidacy. To celebrate the release of its Muppets collaboration in 2011, Opening Ceremony’s Los Angeles outpost spoofed the hometown hero by recreating an Angelyne-style billboard with Miss Piggy.
Nicole Dollanganger: In late August of last year, Grimes announced the launch of Eerie Organization, a cooperative for independent artists. She wasn’t shy about her motivation for its establishment: releasing Nicole Dollanganger’s debut studio album Natural Born Losers. “It blew up my brain so hard that I literally started Eerie to fucking put it out because it’s a crime against humanity for this music not to be heard,” Boucher said of Dollanganger’s haunting hardcore sound. Before its release, Eerie had a billboard put up in Echo Park. “Nicole Dollanganger: North America’s Greatest Living Songwriter,” it read.
Jenny Holzer: It’s strange to think the American artist began her career as an abstract painter. Holzer’s long-celebrated conceptual practice sees words and ideas disseminated in public spaces. Her installations take varied forms, but perhaps most recognizable are light projections, LED signs, posters, marquees, jumbotrons, and billboards. Among her more famous ‘truisms’ to be displayed above motorways: “protect me from what I want” and “abuse of power comes as no surprise.”
Great billboard ad for @Hot_Wheels pic.twitter.com/IvPHi9fcmW
— Christopher Stadler (@cstadler1) July 24, 2016
Hot Wheels: Has done some amazing billboards. This one is really clever; this one just looks hella fun.
KATSU’s Kendall Jenner: Last year, Kendall Jenner became “the first ever victim of drone vandalism,” when graffiti writer and multimedia artist KATSU tagged her Houston Street Calvin Klein billboard using a drone retrofitted with spray painting capabilities. “I was looking at a few locations for the right stage to do the piece. Any billboard of that scale in a city like New York would probably have some shallow celebrity, but the Kendall Jenner billboard was appropriate because she represents this internet divine right,” KATSU told i-D about his decision to test the drone on reality TV royalty. “The billboard fit the use of the tool, but also made for a nice conversation and a nice painting.”
Nike’s live knitting: If you thought Nike would randomly mount a billboard of a gigantic bare foot in the middle of Shanghai, have we got a time lapse video for you. To celebrate the launch of the Nike Free Flyknit, the brand staged a “live knitting” installation in which three workers wove the lightweight sneaker up the enormous foot in real time.
Sunset Strip rock ‘n’ roll: Rock music came of age in the late 60s, and so did the rebel youth blasting it out of their stereos cruising along Los Angeles’ Sunset Strip. Considering how reasonable Strip real estate was at the time, record companies saw billboards as a prime opportunity to connect with younger audiences in a big, bold way. For over a decade, larger-than-life, hand painted billboards advertising the newest releases from legends like The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, and Alice Cooper spangled the Strip. Photographer Robert Landau began chronicling them in 1969, when he was just 16, and compiled these artworks into a book, Rock ‘n’ Roll Billboards of the Sunset Strip, over 40 years later.
#leisure #funny Billboard Swing Set – Double Happiness pic.twitter.com/s8pEpbV6
— OFF mag (@OFFmagacine) January 12, 2012
Double Happiness: In 2011, architect Didier Faustino created an incredible if not slightly terrifying swing set out of a converted billboard for the Shenzhen-Hong Kong Bi-City Biennial of Urbanism and Architecture. “By playing this ‘risky’ game, and testing their own limits, two persons can experience together a new perception of space and recover an awareness of the physical world,” a statement about the installation read.
Credits
Text Emily Manning