[rumori] What's Shoe?

The Evolution Control Committee [rumori] What's Shoe?
Thu, 17 Dec 1998 05:51:29 -0500 (00913891889, 3.0.32.19981217024507.00773630atinfinet.com)

At 12:41 PM 12/16/98 -0500, you wrote:

>
>i'm not knocking mainstream distribution--i do think it's ultimately more
>important to be heard by many than to cling to DIY ideas of authenticity.

I've been wrestling with this thorny dilemma of "no sell-out" vs. "nobody reached" for way too long... I guess my latest feelings have been that it's more important to actually reach people with a message, even if
you do have to water down the message to get it out there. Hopefully, like
Illegal Arts reaching the errant Beck fans, some will be lured in a realize
something outside of their world in the process.


>i just want to put a question mark after 'true' in the ads. i was sticking
>up 'hence the irony' stickers around subway stations in NYC for a while, but
>then got dissuaded after seeing too many of them ripped off a day later.
>also irony ain't what it used to be...(if anyone in NYC is interested in
>helping revive this or some other disinformation campaign, i'd be more
>interested if there could be a greater saturation...ah, back to questions
>about dissemination again. damn.)

Hah; I like the stickers and the question marks... maybe I can't help
in the subways, but I might take up the cause here in Columbus OH and make
some stickers of my own. I've been thinking lately that I haven't been
"contributing" enough lately and I've been trying to round up some flyers to post and stickers to make and so on. Does anyone have any advice for
online resources for fun obnoxious things to post? Sites like Unamerican
have a flyer or three that they've made, but rarely have links to others
like them.
As for getting your stickers ripped down, I can definitely
sympathize.... that's why I went to shoes at one time. Allow me to explain
(and perhaps y'all might get some ideas or motivation as a result):
THE PROBLEM: I was troubled with how one could make "public art" that would stay public and stay art for longer than a flyer or sticker's
expacted lifespan. The solution had to be cheap, relatively permanent, yet
quickly installed.
THE SOLUTION: In Columbus (and select other cities), many "No Parking" and similar road signs are on posts that have a sort of corrugated fold...
a cross-section looks like this:
_
_/ \_

(Try a monospaced font if that didn't look right.) Anyway, they're
pre-drilled with holes evenly spaced every one inch all the way up. I
decided on shoes. Shoes are cheap, readily available, and pierced with two
bolts spaced apart by an even number of inches, readily mounted on the
signs. I painted messages on them; some were political ("Watch less TV", "Don't play the lottery", "Consider revolt"), some were just curious ("Good times lie ahead", "Think about this shoe for a while"). For pairs of shoes, I did pairs of slogans -- "Repent" vs. "Sin", "Never Love" vs. "Never Hate", etc. THE PROCESS: Have your shoe pre-bolted and ready to go. Walk up to the
sign; it's always best with a confederate standing on the other side of the
sign like you're talking to each other. Hand-wind the nuts on the bolts,
which are typically about 5 inches too long for the job. Wind them as tight
as you can, and then (this is important!) bend the excess bolt up and down
until it weakens and breaks off. The bend causes the bolt left on to have
its thread screwed up, so nobody can unscrew the bolts, even with a wrench.
THE SUCCESS RATE: Most had surprising longevity. Some I put up in the
worst areas of town lasted for years, message still intact. Many would
eventually lose the front (top) part of the shoe but the sole of the shoe
stayed up for years. Some stayed up long after the buildings they were in
front of were demolished.

So anyway, that's the shoe project. Not every town has such readily
available canvases, but maybe yours does, and I'm hoping these ideas might
make you look around for similar places you can do your mischief in or on.
Good luck! Comments? Opinions? Ideas?

--
eccatpobox.com The Evolution Control
Committee
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