This isn’t the street art you’re used to- it isn’t created with spray paint or stencils, and it doesn’t mar the face of the urban environment in Paris. In fact, this unusual form of street art beautifies the cityscape, replacing advertising eyesores with classical works of art.
This is the work of street artist/city beautifier Etienne Lavie, who is on a mission to replace billboards all over the city of Paris with something people actually want to look at, such as classical paintings like "Liberty Leading The People" by Eugene Delacroix, in a project called "OMG who stole my ads?"
Eugene's cause is truly noble, although it's doubtful that the advertisers will agree when they find out that their billboards have been appropriated.
-Via Flavorwire
In that respect, I don't think what is being done is necessarily noble, but I certainly (selfishly) would prefer to see classic art over advertisements...
It's noble to want to replace unavoidable eyesores erected by greedy corporations with works of art, which many people aren't exposed to today. Wouldn't we all be better off if we could see some classical art hanging around town instead of ads for teeth whitening systems and wireless service providers?
And advertisers aren't likely to put their crappy ads up in art galleries because they wouldn't be seen by enough people. They need to get their message out to the masses in order to make more money, while artists create art for visual enjoyment and rarely (at least in the case of classical art) look to turn a massive profit on their works.
This is why I'm not sure it's noble. Those spaces are the rental property of the advertisers. They paid for that space.
It would be like if Lavie rented space in an art gallery to show his work, only to discover that advertisers and broken in and covered up his artwork with billboards.