Local artists design signs for ‘Your campaign here’

With the presidential election just 10 months away, Bloomington residents are getting ready to decorate their lawns with presidential hopefuls’ yard signs. However, this year, some of the signs will feature local works of art instead of a candidate’s name.\nYour Art Here, a non-profit organization that gives Indiana artists the opportunity to show their art on public spaces, is sponsoring “Your Campaign Here.” Participants submitted art to be placed on yard signs similar to signs used for political campaigns.\n“The idea behind it is we wanted artists to make a piece of art that challenged and questioned the way in which political messages are portrayed to us,” Your Art Here co-director Brad Wicklund said. “You’ll see the national yard signs for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, even local elections mixed in with these artists’ signs and they’ll start to comment on each other.”\nThe project, which is part of Arts Week 2008, received 41 submissions.\nBoard members then chose three designs to be printed, and placed in volunteers’ yards. There will be 180 signs total, 60 of each winning design. Wicklund said they wanted the signs to have a strong message, but also be easy to read.\nThe first winning sign was a collaboration of two artists, Chiara Galimberti and Geoffrey Hing. Galimberti, an Italian native, said since she is not a U.S. citizen and therefore ineligible to vote, the contest was a chance for her to participate in the campaign.\n“Just seeing all the debate, I thought it was a strong avenue for politics without being a part of it,” Galimberti said. “I’m an outsider, but I still have strong political ideas.”\nAnother winner, Andrew Bucksbarg, said he submitted a piece because he liked the idea of putting art on conventional yard signs. His sign comes from a group of pieces on urban development he created for a previous project.\n“We usually see real estate or ‘for rent’ signs, so people have these kinds of things that come to mind when they see signs,” Bucksbarg said.\nRiva Jewell-Vitale, the third winner in the contest, said she chose to enter because she thought using yard signs was an interesting idea and liked how it imitated the actual campaign going on.\n“I hope people find my sign to be funny,” Jewell-Vitale said. “The campaign is supposed to be serious, so my sign is kind of fun.”\nSigns will be distributed during Arts Week, Feb. 20-March 1. Your Art Here will also create an interactive map of the signs’ locations on their Web site, as well as a blog where residents can leave comments about the project. For more information, visit www.yourarthere.org.