Capping a week of street art feats that saw France’s Invader take to space and the sea floor, Los Angeles-based graffiti veteran Saber deployed his latest skywriting campaign to the skies above New York City yesterday, where five pilots diffused his message protesting Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s threats to cut arts funding — namely to the National Endowment for the Arts — if he is elected.

Dubbed #DefendTheArts, the afternoon skywriting session was funded in part through donations solicited via Saber’s blog and featured social media-coded messages like “#MittRomneyHatesArts” and calls to action like “Protect NPR PBS NEA from cuts.”

“This extreme conservative has no appreciation for the arts or American culture, despite the fact that creative people are the backbone of this country,” Saber wrote on his blog. “It’s time to fight back and prevent these publicly funded and uniquely American organizations from being eliminated.” He previously used skywriting to voice his opposition to Los Angeles’s controversial laws against graffiti murals last year.

“Basically I’m calling out Mitt and any other politicians who are cutting arts funding because they are actually cutting jobs that are an engine to our economy,” Saber told Brooklyn Street Art yesterday during the operation. “Not to mention the effect these programs have on creativity and inspiration.”

— Benjamin Sutton

(Photos via ArrestedMotion/Instagram, Zerocoooool/Instagram)

Tags: Benjamin Sutton, Mitt Romney, Protests, Public Art, Saber, skywriting, Street Art