Artcite exhibit demonstrates foreboding presence of cars
By Josh Kolm
Lance Writer
February 3, 2010
 Living in a city built around the automotive industry creates an obvious social and cultural connection that is often commented on. It is why, in conjunction with this year’s North American International Auto Show, Artcite and the Art Gallery of Windsor have teamed up for a pair of exhibits that showcase this incorporation.
Similarly car-minded with a focus on artists from the Windsor and Detroit area, “Here In My Car: Beyond Autopia and Autogeddon” is Artcite’s contribution that wraps up this week.
The local art and mixed media starts right when you walk through the door. Sandi Wheaton’s time lapse video is comprised of more than 60,000 photos taken during a road trip across pop culture’s most famous road, Route 66. Wheaton’s photos, taken every few seconds from a camera mounted on the dashboard of her vehicle, combine to form a fascinating look at the Chicago-to-Los Angeles trip and road-trip visuals as a whole.
Eric Smith is not as optimistic, as his photos display roads that have fallen into disrepair. The fact that piles of debris and cement blockades litter cracked and overgrown asphalt while new roads are built every day draws a biting parallel with the crumbling auto industry.
One of the imports are photos of the work of Montreal’s Peter Gibson, who has taken the moniker Roadsworth for his on-road paintings that improve upon the street paint we’ve grown accustomed to. An obvious comment on the ways the markings and regulations of the roads subtly control us, he transforms the white and yellow lines into fishhooks, sawed-through planks of wood, and bullets. Others are plays on shadow, with tightrope walkers and dangling sneakers taking their full meaning when the shadow from wires and posts fall in the right position.
Ed Janzen takes the little man from the “Walk” traffic signal and straps him with what looks like dynamite, apparently to even the odds when fighting to cross the paths of the larger, more impatient drivers.
In a similar vein, Tim Laskey, whose bike-centric sculptures are often seen taking to the streets of this city, presents a bicycle and helmet toughened up with black paint jobs and imposing metal additions. What is supposed to be a representation of bicycle riders’ marginalized status on roadways draws a larger association to a Road Warrior-esque apocalyptic wasteland.
It really says something when the look of a bike and helmet draws an association with a certain type of social and economic dystopia. But when considering how, as mentioned before, the automotive industry hangs over every aspect of Windsor life, it seems like a bit of a missed opportunity that the artists didn’t engage with it on a narrower scope.
Maybe it was a mistake to look at these separately. While it is important that the Artcite exhibit is focused mostly on local artists, you don’t get the full comment and critique of automotive influence on culture and society unless you get a chance to view both. The AGW is able to compile international works that observes the wider scale. The artists compiled by Artcite show us what they know when cast against the foreboding presence of cars in their lives.
“Here In My Car: Beyond Autopia and Autogeddon” wraps up on Friday, Feb. 6. Artcite is open from 12 – 5 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. More information can be found at www.artcite.ca.
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