Messenger Teams Up with Facebook Open Arts to Launch Artist-Designed Custom 360 Backgrounds

Messenger and Facebook Open Arts are bringing contemporary art right to your mobile phone! Starting this month, we’re partnering with six artists from underrepresented communities to celebrate diversity, creativity and vibrancy in the arts. Each of the artists will be releasing a new 360 background for Messenger Rooms and video calls that nod to their cultural influences and unique stories. Messenger Rooms lets you create a room to host joinable free video calls with up to 50 people with no time limit. Rooms can be created right from Messenger or Facebook. 

Our first featured artist is Ana Serrano, a first-generation Mexican American inspired by the intersection of her cultural identities. Ana’s work highlights the socio-cultural elements of urban life in Latino neighborhoods, and she is especially captivated by how residents shape and decorate their spaces. Her 360 background is inspired by the eclectic vibe of her hometown, Los Angeles, which combines both formal and informal architectural styles including, mid-century apartments, Cinderella homes, courtyard bungalows and more. Ana wants people to “experience the simple joy of walking down a neighborhood street and discovering details along the way.”

Facebook’s Open Arts exists to build community through creativity, and is thrilled to help bring this artwork to life in a new way starting today. The program collaborates with artists and designers from a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives to invite new ways of thinking about ourselves, our communities and the world at large.

To access Ana’s background simply start a video call or create a Room from Messenger or Facebook, tap the effects icon on your self view then select “backgrounds” to access Ana’s background “Down the Street”. In Messenger you can also access the backgrounds in a video call or via the camera.

We hope you enjoy these new 360 backgrounds and they brighten your virtual hangouts. Look for more inspiring backgrounds as we roll out work from more artists in the coming months!