I’m not too great with introductions. I know a lot of people say that, but it’s especially true in my case. It’s even more especially true today, as I try to introduce myself, through the internet, to DriveAFasterCar.com’s entire readership:

Hi! I’m Ben – student, writer, and new contributor to Drive a Faster Car. I spend a lot of time walking around Atlanta, and I’m occasionally fortunate enough to see something amazing. I’ll be using my time here to point you in the direction of those amazing things.

With that in mind, here’s a quick Guide To Becoming Famous:

1) Find a public space. There should be a few hundred people walking around; I did pretty well with Piedmont Park this Sunday.
2) Start searching for a group of three to five SCAD students – one of them will be holding a sign reading something like, “Draw Pictures With Us”, or “Make Art!” The others will be asking people to draw pictures.
3) If you stand around gawking long enough, one of the students (not the one holding the sign) will hand you a 4×4 inch sheet of paper and a few colored pencils.
4) Get drawing.
5) Return your drawn-on paper to the group.

Congratulations – you’re famous!

The Art House Co-op is currently setting up (and enlisting artists for) a few other collaborative projects along these lines. This one sounds especially promising:

“We are sending out mini accordion file folders. We want you to take them with you and fill them up with all of your personal objects – including receipts, ticket stubs, lists, Polaroids, or anything else that defines you and your life. Then, we’re going to throw a gallery show with all of the accordion folders, free for people to browse through.”

In addition to local shows, Art House also coordinates several national collaborative projects, like A Million Little Pictures (showing tonight in San Francisco), The Great Art House Print Exchange, and the Pen Pal Painting Exchange. All of their projects focus on tying together artists of widely dispirit experience levels. The end product of these collaborations are often disjointed or even mediocre, but occasionally brilliant.

You can see work created by me (and nine hundred ninety-nine other famous Atlantans):