Taken from wikipedia.org.

A flash mob (or flashmob) is a large group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform an unusual action for a brief time, then quickly disperse. The term flash mob is generally applied only to gatherings organized via telecommunications, social media, or viral emails. The term is generally not applied to events organized by public relations firms or as publicity stunts.

I was completely unaware of this amazing act of public art until recently. Thanks to youtube it’s pretty easy to see some flash mobs in action. This one, entitled “Frozen Grand Central”, is one of the more popular ones and I think it’s quite poignant.

Why am I talking about this? Because my friend Ashley is organizing a flash mob to take place in downtown San Luis Obispo to see if our little town is ready for big city style displays of public performance art.

We need at least 100 people to make this work well. I’m not sure if a title has been chosen for this particular piece, but for now I will call it “The Red And Yellow Mixer”.

Anybody can participate and the more the merrier! Parents are also encouraged to bring their little ones to expose them to weird art stuff. Because hey, every kid needs to experience weird art happenings. It’s “culture”, people.

Are you in? If so, you’ll need two things. One orange shirt and also one yellow or one red shirt. That’s two shirts total. Nothing fancy. Pick something up at Goodwill if you have to. Ideally, there will be the same amount of reds as there are yellows.

Next, meet at The New Times parking lot on the corner of Osos and Marsh in downtown San Luis Obispo at 6:30pm this Thursday, August 20, 2009.

For more info contact Ashley, aschwellenbach@newtimesslo.com