Shopdrop: To covertly place merchandise on display in a store. A form of "culture jamming" s. reverse shoplift, droplift. *

As coined and defined by Ryan Watkins-Hughes in 2004 (documentation)

SHOPDROPPING is an ongoing project in which I alter the packaging of goods and shopdrop the items back onto store shelves. I replace the packaging with labels created using my photographs and painting. The shopdropped works act as a series of art objects that people can purchase from the store. Because the barcodes and price tags are left intact purchasing the altered items before they are discovered and removed is possible. In one instance shopdropped canned goods were even restocked to a new aisle based on the barcode information.

SHOPDROPPING strives to take back a share of the visual space we encounter on daily basis. Similar to the way street art stakes a claim to public space for self expression, my shopdropping project subverts commercial space for artistic use in an attempt to disrupt the mundane commercial process with a purely artistic moment. The vibrant individuality of each image is a stark contrast to the repetitive, functional, package design that is replaced. Shopdropping gives voice to the pervasive disillusionment from our increasingly commercial society. A voice that is, paradoxically, made possible only by commercial technological advancements.

For a 2009 exhibition at Heist Gallery in NYC, we took shopdropping one step further. To properly display this project in a gallery, but also within its original context, we needed to transform the space into a passable store. Leading up to the opening we announced that the gallery was going out of business and then opened a fully functional "bodega-style" market (The Eisenberg Deli & Grocery in honor of the owner of Heist, Talia Eisenberg.) for the month that the show was open. Over the course of the month we confused a lot of the neighborhood, pissed off the Chinese mafia types, got busted by the police, and convinced a fair number of the art audience that Heist was no more. In the end it was a bit of a reverse shopdrop. Or maybe a reverse reverse shoplift?

(A new collaborative project is scheduled for early 2010.)

* Due to the broadening usage of 'shopdropping' as a term, I have removed the sentence "Primarily used in tactical media projects and art installations." from the definition. The increased awareness of the term "culture jamming" also makes the removed sentence redundant. The synonym "droplift" comes from The Droplift Project as linked to in the Related Projects page on this site. (RWH Dec. 26 2007)