Etienne Lavie’s project replaces street advertisements in Paris with images of classical paintings.
The pictures show those works inserted into public advertising frames, bus-shelter displays, station signage, and other city fixtures. In one image, a billboard-sized frame holds a painting of two seated nude figures while several people stand in front of it. Another shows a saint-like figure in a dark street kiosk at dusk, with wet pavement reflecting red and amber light. Elsewhere, a framed painting appears under an overpass beside passing cars; another sits in a metro setting marked PARIS NORD, where the classical image shares the wall with station lettering and commuters. Across the set, the replacements appear in different weather and light conditions: daylight, evening, rain, and sunset.
Classical images in the city
The inserted paintings vary in subject and palette. Some are pale and softly lit; others are darker, with deep greens, browns, and low evening light. One frame shows a landscape with trees and a small figure near the bottom left. Another presents a pastoral scene with a central gathering of figures. A different image places a portrait beside a café terrace and a corner building. The ad spaces remain visible as ad spaces: metal frames, glass fronts, printed signage, and shelters still define the surfaces, even when the commercial image has been replaced.
The set also includes quieter locations away from dense traffic. One frame stands near water and bare trees in a park-like setting. Another is placed at a roadside edge near houses and a fence. A final image shows a billboard against a sunset sky, with a van parked below and pedestrians crossing in the foreground. The relationship between the paintings and their surroundings changes from image to image, but the structure stays consistent: a public advertising site, now holding a classical painting instead of an ad.
Advertising spaces, same frame
Because the works are shown inside existing street-display frames, the images keep the scale and placement of advertising while changing the content inside them. The result depends on contrast: the stillness of painted figures against moving pedestrians, traffic, station architecture, shopfronts, and urban weather. In several photographs, people glance toward the frame; in others, they pass without stopping. The project is visible as a sequence of substitutions, each one anchored to a different corner of Paris.
Artist Etienne Lavie in his recent project, ‘OMG who stole my ads?’ , replaced various street advertisements with masterpieces of classical art in Paris. This creative juxtaposition of classical painting in the modern world is probably the best way to transform the urban landscape and also to grab the public attention to classical art.
