Scuzzy-looking Toronto newspaper boxes threatened with artistic makeover

Batteries of newspaper boxes are a familiar sight at the corners of big-city intersections.

Now Sun Media group apparently has been warned to spruce up the beat-up boxes that dispense its 24 Hours giveaway paper in Toronto. And not by the city.

According to blogTO, the founder of a group called the 24 Hour Box Guerrilla Art Makeover Project issued the ultimatum a couple of weeks ago, Aug. 24 to be exact. Rolyn Chambers said Sun Media had 24 days to remove the boxes or clean them up. If not, it's open season on them.

"Artists can paint them, stencil them, graffiti art them," Chambers explains.

He says boxes can be covered in plaster and turned into creatures, "decoupage'd, papier maché'd, covered in fake flowers, cereal, buttons, fake gems, or perhaps fun fur . . .

"The goal is to make the box better not worse.

The project's website calls the boxes eyesores.

"Their once bright orange exteriors are now covered with street grime, graffiti, stickers and posters. This is more than a sign that Sun Media who owns these boxes does not care about its image but it is company that has little regard for the communities that they place them in. And we, the citizens of Toronto, are letting this happen."

So far, Sun Media hasn't reacted and blogTO poster Derek Flack wonders if the company even knows about the threat. And once it does, what will it do?

"Will Sun Media sit by as artists "improve" the boxes, or will it comply with the request? Or will the guerrilla artists ultimately be nabbed for their vandalistic good intentions? Place your bets."