Poster Gallery: ArtQuid transforms subway stations into an art gallery by exclusively placing art on large posters

The Berlin transport network connects 166 S-Bahn stations and 173 U-Bahn stations. At most stations, the large-scale posters in 18/1 format are located behind the tracks or directly on the platform. These can be selected individually and booked for short or longer campaigns. Large posters in train stations are very popular with advertisers, because 1.4 million Berliners use the trains every day, and of course wait for them. Waiting time is advertising time. While train rivers wait for the next underground or suburban train, they have enough time to take a close look at the large-format posters behind the tracks, to actively consume the advertising messages or even scan QR codes.  Important transfer stations are particularly popular because they generate especially high number of advertising contacts due to the high passenger numbers. In order to generate concentrated attention, some stations in Berlin offer the possibility to exclusively use all poster spaces and turn them into a Poster Gallery. With a Poster Gallery, advertisers can highlight different aspects or products. Or they can tell a story by distributing individual advertising contents on several posters.

In October 2020, we organized a Poster Gallery for our client ArtQuid. ArtQuid offers artists from different countries an online platform where art lovers can buy, sell and share the artworks online, as print or in 3D format. To promote this social network, the operator first occupied stations in Paris and London, and now in Berlin. The project Expo Metro Berlin comprised a total of 20 large-scale posters at Mehringdamm and Zoologischer Garten and transformed the train stations into a veritable art gallery. As a mosaic of artworks, the poster panels offered several artists space for their art. The Poster Gallery presented a very suitable medium for the online gallery of ArtQuid. The station, alienated from its original function, was full of works of art and invited train passengers to look at them and, perhaps, to neglect the next other train, and rather continue to linger in the art gallery.