A Fort Saskatchewan, Alta., artist has challenged 100 artists to draw a 1950 Ford from memory for an upcoming show at the Art Gallery of Alberta in Edmonton.

It's not such a strange request, Anthony Easton, a photographer, writer and guest curator, told CBC News.

It's a riff on a 1977 text painting by U.S. artist Ed Ruscha, which comprises the words: Will 100 Artists Please Draw a 1950 Ford From Memory.

"It's not really about the 1950 Ford. It's about questions and answers, it's about how memory works," Easton said.

He issued the invitation to about 400 artists to get his 100 participants.

And they're artists in the broadest sense of the word, including graphic artists, book illustrators, conceptual artists and others who use drawing in their trade.

Many of them have no memory at all of a 1950 Ford, some have seen one only in the movies or in other art works.

The exercise is a tribute to Ruscha, a painter, photographer and filmmaker connected with the rise of pop art, Easton said.

Ruscha issued his challenge in a "loose and jokey way," Easton said.

And artists have taken it that way — blogger Yuka Yamaguchi has drawn a 1950 made-in-Japan bicycle with the same brand name: Ford.

Ruscha himself is still living and working in California and has been notified about the project.

"I've always been really inspired by his work and I find it really wry and funny," said Easton, who arranged the show as a guest curator for the Art Gallery of Alberta.

Easton's own work, 100 Pickup Trucks In and Around Fort Saskatchewan, is a homage to Ruscha's photo piece Every Building on the Sunset Strip, which accordions out to show every individual building.

"I work as a writer and in visual work and I think he combines them in interesting ways," Easton said.

The show, Will 100 Artists Please Draw a 1950 Ford From Memory, will run Sept. 22 to Jan. 6, 2008, at the Art Gallery of Alberta.