I often work in slant mode. Whether through abstraction, symbolic imagery, or magical realism, I like my work to be open to more than one interpretation. This way, both the subject of the work and the work’s viewer are recognized as the individual beings they are, in flux and replete with potential. I think of art as invitation to the viewer to come to their own meaning while considering the possibilities of the subject’s worldview as well. For me, a slant approach to art opens access to more dialogical forms of communication.
I imagine this building is somewhat well known in this fictional place. I think it was probably converted into living space while the world was busy being a little more post-apocalyptic than solarpunk, with new residents scavenging materials from whatever they could. It’s since grown into a sort of community art project, proud of its history, squatters’ rights, and the reuse of its materials. The first floor is mixed residential/commercial space (you’d almost have to go out of your way to keep a former parking garage from being handicapped accessible, but I figure some first floor places would make things much easier). The roof is covered in a fruit tree orchard; I used apple, pear, and peach trees, all carefully found and cut out in detail before I completely blasted them to get them to fit the style I was picturing. I figure these are in big planters rather than directly on the surface of the roof. The building can support it, but standing water, especially in places that freeze, can be really bad for buildings, and tree roots can crack concrete just as well as ice.
I thought a lot about the design for the streetcar. I was torn between wanting its purpose to be visually clear at a glance and wanting to show something genuinely strange or futuristic.
I settled on a 1910s-ish streetcar both because it’s visually clear and because I think it might be a practical starting point for a society that’s trying to rebuild from scratch using entirely local manufacturing. The design is crude, but it’s proven—streetcars like this were ubiquitous in the US once upon a time. And they used 1910s-era motors, controls, metallurgy, and manufacturing. It feels like this would be a reasonable starting point, especially with a ready supply of scavenged components and high quality metals laying around above ground in the form of existing vehicles (even wrecks).
I like to imagine that this is a newer phase in this city’s public transit infrastructure, that they’re starting to standardize their vehicles to simplify things. I like the idea that the first generation of these streetcars would be genuinely a community project, that the city/public transit folks settled on some specifications and devoted their limited budget and manufacturing to producing standardized bases, (the bottom frame, wheels, motors, and pantograph rig) and that people build the carriages out of whatever they have access to. Each streetcar would be a unique, craft-built contraption, sort of ‘public transit by way of Weekend Wasteland’: all kinds of crazy streetcars made from campers, boats, old school buses, whatever people had access to. City safety inspectors and a committee of local people, with an emphasis on the disabled, would review each one and specify any necessary changes. This gets them a fleet of ready streetcars quickly, allowing them to start providing services while more slowly manufacturing standardized ones to replace the most problematic of the home-built machines.
The slow standardization would be somewhat contentious within a community that took pride in building its own infrastructure, and in the art-like variety. They might chafe at standardization and formalization, like it’s a sign that society is stratifying again, though the convenience of a more reliable transit network might help balance it out. As a nod to the artistic spirit and history of the fleet, the new vehicles are painted uniquely by members of the community.
This piece originally appeared under a Creative Commons license onthe artist’s portfolio.
