we can dig it

…I hear tell not this much snow since ’71…

Baby, it’s cold outside.

So here we are in Montréal.

The jetlag has almost gone but it was a loooong journey. To get here as cheaply as possible we had a 13 hour stopover in Honolulu, sleeping on chairs in the airport and that left us in transit for a couple of days total. But if it gets you here, it gets you here eh?

We are staying here in Ville Emard with Lena and Jean-Yves, who are kindly putting us up (and putting up with us) for the duration. I am very conscious of disrupting their lives but it’s great to see them again.

It’s been below 0˚ each day so far, but Matt and I have never seen so much snow so at this stage the cold is simply exhilarating.

The metro is idiot-proof and what we have seen of the city so far is rather lovely. Most of it is covered in snow right now but there are delicious bits poking up out of it like the tiled gatepost above at Parc de Portugal.

Snowflakes and Nylon

Sometimes I discover an artist who just fills me with a total joy in what they are doing. They tackle issues so gently, charmingly and playfully that they never feel bossy or instructive. They just inspire you to want to go play with them and join in their jolly crusade.

This morning I stumbled over Finnish artist Riitta Ikonen while trawling through the web waiting for some video to render.

The work pictured is Snowflake from 2007.

For two years now we haven’t had snow in Finland for Christmas. This is very unusual and worrying and prompted me to start an ongoing site specific project looking at the effects of global warming.

I also like the project Human Nylon where she took on the role of the man-made fabric in order to investigate and honour the importance it has in our lives.

But having long held an interest in the concept of making artworks for animals myself (I’ve just never worked out quite how I want to do it yet), the work I loved most of all was the public service artwork for urban wildlife Don’t be a Roadkill. Ikonen ‘performed’ as roadkill to educate squirrels and the like about road safety and distributed fortune cookies for them amongst the parks, containing road safety instructions and affirmative messages like “I will not become a roadkill today”.

You can see more on her website HERE.

New York story

In January of 2001 I spent 3 weeks in New York and fell seriously in love with the place. This photo is of Stella and I caught in a snowstorm at around 4 in the morning. Photo credit goes to a drunken irishman.

While there we were occasionally (force) entertained by the son of our hosts, a self-involved jewish guy with a lazy eye named Harry. Harry loved well-endowed women (he was very attentive… yikes…) rock music and… Weird Al Yancovic. Harry told me that one of his hobbies was also writing ‘comedy’ song parodies of his favourite rock hits. There were many, many that I have since forgotten but the one that has stuck with me forever was a parody of an Aerosmith song. His version – ‘Lovin’ a deli waiter’.

Cast your mind back… have you got the original?

Booyah.

EDIT 1/11/07: I didn’t realise it was so obscure! Love in an Elevator, Lovin’ a deli waiter… gettit… you know maybe this story isn’t as funny as I thought…