Downtown West Palm Beach will be transformed into a giant, real-life board game. Prior to the Canvas Outdoor Museum Show in November, British artist Dean Zeus Coleman will paint 13,000 square feet of sidewalk into what he calls a "Streetopoly" board.
The art installment will be painted on a stretch of sidewalk starting at the end of Clematis Street and ending near 4th street. It will be designed to lead people from the heart of downtown to the parks with CANVAS artwork along the waterfront.
Coleman says the idea is for people to be the game pieces.
"You can come out with dice and throw the dice and kind of jump along," he said.
The city of West Palm Beach contributed $11,000 to the project from its Art in Public Places budget. Raphael Clemente, spokesman for the city's Downtown Development Authority says the project, along with year-long CANVAS art installments will attract people to West Palm Beach and be positive for the local economy.
"We want people to come here and see this place and say, 'you know what, I want to live there or I want to open a business there or I want to invest there.' And that's how it happens," Clemente said, "You can market your place all you want, but when people have an incredible experience in that place, that's what connects them to it."
Coleman plans to paint the green base of the Streetopoly board this week, then will start sectioning the board off. More than 200 local and international artists who are a part of the CANVAS Outdoor Museum Show will paint in the squares. It's expected to be completed by the start of the show in mid-November.
Once it's completed, city leaders say they plan to present the project to Guinness Book of World Records as the world's longest mural.