WeTransfer + Ace Hotel Partner for Innovative Art Exhibit: Dear DTLA

WeTransfer, everyone’s favorite file sharing service, has partnered up with Ace Hotel for an innovative billboard art project dubbed Dear DTLA.

Perhaps you’ve spotted the cryptic red and white billboard and wondered what it was all about. Well, here’s the scoop:

Dear DTLA invites artists from around the globe to broadcast their work on a highly visible platform in heart of the Theater District in Downtown, bringing WeTransfer’s content sharing from behind the scenes to the streets. The initiative will showcase work from a different artist each month and will run through February 2016.

The prominent billboard functions as an art exhibit, and unlike traditional galleries, exhibiting work can be owned or downloaded for free via WeTransfer at deardtla.com. We caught up with WeTransfer’s Fatma Genç for a quick chat about the progressive new collaboration.

LAC: How did the Dear DTLA project come to fruition? 

FG: Since we’re always on the lookout for local artists to feature on our full screen editorial wallpapers and growing in the US, we wanted to engage our LA based creative community. It was earlier this year when we heard of the visual pollution caused by digital billboards and all the different messages you come across when walking through the city. As one of our goals is to show how online advertising can be so much more than a click through or a huge call-to-action medium, we decided to bring this dynamic into the offline world.

Why did you choose to feature the project in Los Angeles, specifically at Ace Hotel? 

We’re huge fans of Ace Hotels, for their approachability, hospitality, design and creativity. When we visited the NY and DTLA hotel we immediately noticed a huge synergy between both our brands. They’re design driven and create inspiring and empowering experiences next to their core services.

How did you select your participating artists? How’d you make that choice? 

We’ve been in search of artists for a long time, especially for our online wallpapers. This was the starting point for our vision on the Dear DTLA artists.  We try to lookout for emerging artists, innovative projects and relevant themes. An example is that together with Ace Hotels we look at the form/content division per piece and how the artwork will resonate with its physical environment. We take into consideration how the artwork could be received on a street level, but also how it looks on our platform.

Will We Transfer be doing more of these art installations around the country?

We are absolutely looking into much more offline presence in the United States and share our hassle free transfers of content. We’re celebrating creativity in any form, by supporting emerging talent, by owned events, partnerships and much more. Through our curated backgrounds, both advertising and editorial, we noticed the dynamic of our users turning into explorers. This is something to be thankful of and it’s absolutely inspiring to bring this discovery into the offline world.