LONDON.- Jeremy Deller, David Batchelor and Ruth Ewan will be among the first artists to reveal their billboard artworks promoting independent, local businesses for Your Ad Here. They will launch a series of more than 20 artist/business artworks that will go on display around Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park during 2014. An open call is now in place inviting further artists and businesses to join the project.

Batchelor has produced an energetic and colourful artwork for Choosing Keeping stationers on Columbia Road, Bethnal Green. Ewan has worked closely with the family that own children’s clothing and toy store Mother’s Hub in Stoke Newington on an ad which includes a nod to the Socialist Sunday School movement set up in the area and also has a drawing from the owners’ daughter. Deller has produced an advert for Walthamstow’s William Morris Gallery where he currently has an exhibition. Other partnerships include La Forchetta pizzeria in Bethnal Green with Lauren Godfrey and Finger Licking Caribbean Takeaway in Hackney with Lucas Price.

Your Ad Here is a new project for east London and the large-scale artwork-come-adverts will be displayed on more than two kilometres of hoardings in and around Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park for up to five years. The creative ads will target passing traffic and local shoppers. The project is a celebration of the small independent businesses that are such an important part of life in the city; businesses that would not normally have the resources for large-scale advertising. It also sets out to connect them with the large and diverse community of artists in east London and to create partnerships between the business and creative sectors.

Businesses wanting to take part can register via the Your Ad Here website (www.your-ad-here.co.uk). Interested artists should also visit the site where they will be able to select a business from those that have registered and submit an idea for an advert. Artists can also encourage their favourite shops and businesses to register.

All businesses who have registered will be invited to attend one of two free workshops with a top advertising agency to learn skills in marketing and promoting their business. These will be held in April, more details will be announced on the website.

Dennis Hone, Chief Executive, London Legacy Development Corporation, said: “This exciting project, launched just before the south of the Park opens on 5 April, will create strong links between local businesses and the creative sector. It is our vision for east London to be a thriving cultural district and Your Ad Here is just one part of our ambitious plans for arts and culture in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.?"

As part of the global shift away from traditional business models towards collaborative consumption and the sharing economy, Your Ad Here is supporting the QEOP and Shoreditch Trust initiative Echo. Echo is an Economy of Hours, a marketplace without money. It puts a whole new spin on business by trading in time and skills, not pounds and pence. The exchange rate couldn’t be easier: 1 hour = 1 Echo. In return for the design, fabrication and installation of the advert, all chosen businesses will be asked to sign up to Echo.