Family EXPO OVERRIDE : EXPO Chicago

During EXPO Chicago, Family (1976), a painting by AFRICOBRA founder Gerald Williams, was featured on OVERRIDE, an ephemeral digital exhibition installed on the Chicago City Digital Network (CDN), a series of digital billboards strategically placed throughout the city of Chicago.

Normally, each billboard constantly flips through a series of advertising messages. As part of the contractual arrangement with the billboard operators and advertisers, The City of Chicago is allowed a certain number of flips on each billboard for their announcements. The city donates some of those flips to the OVERRIDE project, which replaces advertising images with works of art. Most people who see these billboards are riding in cars or on public transportation. The artworks interrupt the advertising, challenging the expectations of viewers and blurring the boundary between advertising space, civic messaging, and public art.

Family portrays four figures—two adults and two children—along with written messages such as “BE AND DO WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE” and “BE FOR US.” The painting the earliest conversations amongst AFRICOBRA founders, when they determined a set of concepts and themes around which their work would be based. The first theme they arrived at was positive images of the Black family. The appearance of this historic painting by Williams coincided with the opening of I AM SOMEBODY, an exhibition of history AFRICOBRA works at The Peninsula Hotel during EXPO week.