JULIÁN OLIVER CLARA BOJ DIEGO DÍAZ

Introduction
The Artvertiser is a computer vision project exploring live, locational substitution of advertising content for the purposes of exhibiting digital artwork.
The Artvertiser takes Puerta del Sol Madrid, Times Square New York, Shibuya Tokyo and other sites dense with advertisements as exhibition space. The Artvertiser is an instrument of conversion and reclamation, taking imagery seen by millions and re-purposing it as a surface for presentation of art.
By 'training' a computer to recognize billboard advertisements, logos and other images of commerce, that content can then be 'replaced' with alternative material when seen through a specially engineered hand-held viewing device. If an internet connection is present at the site, it can be documented and published in on line galleries such as Flickr and YouTube.
While offering itself as a new platform for public art, The Artvertiser seeks to highlight the contradiction of Public Space in the context of what can and cannot be written on the surface of our cities. Neither graffiti or Fine Art, The Artvertiser exploits the inevitable redistribution of these surfaces in media such as digital film and photography by producing an alternative experience of the city.
By leveraging the internet as an up-scaling redistribution mechanism, The Artvertiser supposes that an urban site dense with proprietary imagery can be re-purposed as an exhibition space and archived as such. Similarly, on-site exhibitions can be held whereby pedestrians are invited to use the looking device to view an exhibition on the buildings around them.
Progress
The Artvertiser is currently in the software development phase. Demonstrations of the project in action will be posted here shortly.
Artist Testimony
Julian Oliver, Clara Boj and Diego Diaz are experienced artists working in the vein of Augmented Reality, computer vision and computer graphics. Between them they share 30 years of practice across these areas, having worked with the technology in both research and fine-arts settings.
Their work has been exhibited in major museums and electronic art-festivals in Europe, Asia and North America and has received many awards and commissions.