ARCADIA

Ace Museum
2014

The subject is the Interstate Highway system, the largest structure in the world, at 43,000 miles, conceived and designed as a single entity. It was designed as a military structure to transport tanks anywhere in the US, in the event of an airborne invasion. Its secondary function is for the transportation of goods, most importantly oil products. Almost incidentally it is a social network, giving rise to auto cults and snowbird migrations. These ideas are clearly seen in the city of Los Angeles and its surrounding deserts.  The work documents, analyses, and classifies through drawings, the machines driven by the men and women who ride and maintain this armature. Glimpses of the fetishes of blue collar America, the classical Kenworth truck, the baroque curve of the stainless container, and the pearlised gleam of the custom car. The lovingly embellished mass- produced objects become stand-ins for their owners. The work exposes the illusions and delusions of freedom of any individual tied to this compelling, restrictive system, and the fragility of a society dependant on a supply of cheap oil. The titles of the works indicate they are history, and portrait at one and the same time.