This inspired me.

I am always inspired when I come home from driving behind a row of trucks in a resource state like WA, where mining is King and the arts are a spare wheel, and look at the pics I printed from last year of Philadelphia's Mural Arts Program which worked with 10 garbage trucks and created what I think are inspired works.

I kept trying to explain to my friends why this was such a great idea, which of course, I thought was self-explantory but it wasn't to them. So I am posting pics and links so you can read more about this. It's art coming out of the streets, out of the galleries, and into people's lives. Cheers me up just thinking about it.

The project had another role, that of encouraging more constructive direction for the city's grafitti problem. Rather than turning them into outlaws, this city is showing grafitti artists that there is a civic role for them and making them a part of the city and community.

[from WEJETSET]:  "You’ve never seen Recycling Trucks look this good. Philadelphia’s Mural Arts Program partnered with The Design Center at Philadelphia University to wrap 10 Trucks with bold graphics inspired by historic textiles."

In 2006-7 Yonkers was the first to really get into the idea of partnering art with garbage trucks. That project I think inspired a lot of others like Philadelphia's. I wish people would realise that with the right partnerships and good will, scant resources don't have to be main reason for not doing something. Below is the article from the New York Times 2006 about the first project I heard about in Yonkers.