and it is very much an american portrait, titled "out of many, one," e pluribus unum. it also plays off another idiom, that of marketing. >> the face represents the celebration of diversity. and i think that diversity is what made, one of the things that made the nation so great. the idea is to use the same ideas of scale and position and everything else used in marketing for completely different reasons. not to sell you anything but to let us contemplate the idea of identity. >> brown: rodriguez-gerada, 48, was born in cuba and raised in new jersey. his early work, in the 1990s, was subversive, altering billboards in ways that questioned the motives and methods of advertisers, especially in urban areas. you started out doing essentially illegal-type work and then there you are standing on the national mall asked to do this. is it not ironic for you? >> in fact, during that time, we were able to get enough of that work done that tobacco advertising was taken off the billboards. when i was doing that it was because i really thought it was awful, i wasn't hurting anyone