Tonight, between 7 and 11pm EST, the massive flashing billboards that line Times Square, and that embody New York City for many around the world, will get a face lift.

Rather than pulsing with ads from Coke or Pepsi, they will fill with art. 

Tonight’s event is the culmination of a 3 month long competition called Art Takes Times Square, where undiscovered artists vie for placement on the worlds largest canvas.

The company behind Art Takes Times Square is called Artists Wanted, and they are one of our most recent investments.

The Times mentioned OATV’s involvement in their profile of the event and the company yesterday. The piece also reveals the winner of the Art Takes TIme Square contest as Vicki DeSilva, a 52 year old, substitute teacher from Allentown, PA. 

Vicki exemplifies what we see as an accelerating trend in empowering and amplifying the efforts of individual creators of things- be it art, music, design or devices. Artists Wanted, and their soon to be released service, See, are furthering this trend with platforms to connect and enable collaborations between creatives, across disciplines and across the world. 

How many more wildly talented creatives are tucked away in the Allentown, PA’s of the world?

Our bet is that there are many many more Vicki’s out there. And our belief is that the scalable services from Artists Wanted will play an increasingly important role in helping them not only get discovered, but discover just how far they can go with their creations.

If you’re in NYC, I’d encourage you to get down to Times Square tonight to see the billboards. Questlove will be your host for the night. If you can’t make it in person you’ll be able to see the billboards and event live broadcast here.