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TEDxAthens
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Event activation 2024 — Motor Oil · Collective Mosaic

3,000 strangers built one picture. It still hangs in their offices.

One image broken into thousands of numbered cells. Every attendee who passed the wall filled one.

Edition

TEDxAthens 2024

Venue

Peiraios 260

Date

5 October 2024

Partner

Motor Oil
Volunteers filling the mosaic grid at the wall
Collective Mosaic, mid-build — Peiraios 260, 5 October 2024

Programme elements

BriefParticipatory, not decorative

Motor Oil wanted an activation about collective effort. Something participatory rather than decorative.

IdeaColour by number, at wall scale

One image broken into thousands of numbered cells, printed across a wall the length of the foyer. Pick a marker, find your number, fill your cell. Four colours, four instructions, nothing else to explain.

The picture only resolved once enough people had taken part — no one could finish it alone.

By the end of the day it was complete.

BuildDesigned from the outset as a permanent artwork

Concept, graphic design, production and installation 100% TEDxAthens in-house. Custom stretcher frame, competitively tendered.

Built to outlast the event: designed from the outset as a permanent artwork. Collected by Motor Oil’s own carrier and installed at their offices.

Across the day

The instruction wall, colour by number
01 — Four instructions, four markers. One is for red, two for yellow, three for orange, four for pink.
A hand filling one numbered cell with a blue marker
02 — One cell, one number, one hand
The grid filling in, numbers still visible in the unpainted cells
03 — Every unpainted cell still shows its number. The picture arrives from the edges in.

The day, in motion

TEDxAthens × Motor Oil · 2024

Film still — the mosaic being built Watch on YouTube

Thousands of hands, one picture, filmed as it happened.

The wall ran the length of the day. The film follows the grid from the first cell to the last.

100%

TEDxAthens IP, idea to installation

1

Artwork, thousands of hands

130

Partner tickets

1

Permanent installation, still in place

[TBC]

Cell count

What happened next

Three months later, a hotel that had seen the mosaic contacted us through the website asking us to build one for their own 350-person event.

The activation generated inbound business for us, and an artwork Motor Oil still owns.