Send In The Crones

September 18, 20223 Comments

street art sticker in shape of heart with word "Crone" — Love is for us old people, too. A “Crone” heart, Lawrenceville

Aging, your author’s bluntly-honest, not-entirely-tactful, and dearly-missed father-in-law used to say, ain’t for sissies. As someone with more yesterdays than tomorrows, I can attest to this firsthand. The body starts breaking down in all sorts of unexpected ways; the mind wanders off to Lulu land more frequently than we’d like to admit; young whippersnappers run rings around us in all ways that whippersnappers may run.

large hand-created sticker with words "Aging is Sexy" — Read the news: aging is sexy. Lawrenceville

… but I’m a dude—and that means it’s just easier for me. Older men are granted a kind of societal clout simply by virtue of their gender that women don’t enjoy. Graying men are often described as wise, established, and “silver fox” handsome. (Still crossing my fingers for that last one.) Women of the same age share no such common, stereotypical positives.

Far from it. American society is youth-obsessed, for sure, but it’s mainly obsessed with young women. Ms. Orbit—she of my same vintage—often describes the experience as one of “becoming invisible” and feeling “no longer relevant” to the outside world.

large hand-created sticker with word "Crone" — Crone crystal, Oakland

Just about one year ago, we spotted a small hand-written sticker attached to a residential parking sign post in Lawrenceville. The text was a simple double-entendre: Menopause is HOT. That got a snort-laugh out of yours truly and I bagged it for the road.

That little teaser was quickly followed by an array of more elaborate, hand-colored stickers spread on lamp posts and electrical boxes. They all contained simple messages proudly addressing the very uncommon subject—either in wider culture or here at the street level—of middle-aged women as real, present beings: Aging is Sexy; Crone; Menopause.

sticker on post reading "Menopause is hot" — Menopause is HOT, Lawrenceville

We don’t know who created these subtle, gently-subversive little works. None of the pieces we’ve found have any attribution and the Orbit hive mind was unable (or unwilling) to name names. We’re also left to interpret the artists’ message.

We do know the statements are attention-grabbing and hilariously out-of-context—seeing the word menopause bedazzled and glorified in the leftover spaces where taggers dwell is objectively funny.

Ms. Orbit and I have discussed the matter much in the course of our relationship, crossing into deep middle-age, and specifically with her experiences as a woman and an artist. For these reasons, I wanted to turn the rest of the story over to her:

Middle-aged women become invisible to a degree. But, rather than lamenting that fact, I’m enjoying the hell out of the invisibility, because it means a certain kind of freedom. It means the freedom of not having to matter to men, not worrying about being pretty, sexy, feminine enough, thin enough, demure enough, not too loud, not too opinionated. Men no longer care what I look like, sound like, say, etc. When I was younger, I often stepped outside the lines by being too loud, too bold, too feisty and was admonished by men and sometimes by other women. Now, those folks no longer care what I have to say or how I look and I feel the freedom to be fully myself, on my own terms.

large heart-shaped hand-created sticker with word "Crone" — Crone, Bloomfield

There are a lot of younger women now who are proudly and publicly themselves in a “give no fucks” way and I love it, admire it fully—Lizzo comes to mind. Of course, I have had my moments of feeling the negative side of aging and have grappled with thoughts that “I’m no longer relevant,” but the flip side is you can choose to matter to yourself and the important folks in your life. It’s beautiful to live without needing external validation. I wholeheartedly praise the artist or artists behind these stickers because it’s a way of shouting “We’re here! We exist! We matter!” and being proud of that. Ageism is real—just like racism and homophobia and sexism—but you counter that ugliness by fully owning and celebrating who you are.

large hand-created sticker with word "Menopause" — Menopause, Bloomfield

When Suzanne Werder and I did the Drawn Together: A Coming of Middle Age Story in 62 Portraits show this past April, the reaction from women over 50 who came to see the show was intensely positive, almost incredulous—they felt seen. “You showed your wrinkles, and bags under your eyes!” Now, we didn’t set out to make a point of our flaws, but in just drawing each other everyday, we can’t escape our truth: that we are getting older and we are not supermodels, and we’re okay with that.

That show did a lot to make me more comfortable in my own skin. There’s a lot of push back culturally against the notion that people are supposed to look or act a certain way, that our world is supposed to mirror the narrow scope of idealized bodies in traditional advertising. Now, it’s more common to see images of people of all sizes, colors, ages, abilities, and sexualities represented, and the power of that is huge. It makes us realize that we are all relevant and beautiful and always were.

Collage Dropout: The Return of The Midnight Montagier

September 5, 20211 Comment

colorful collage of cartoon images, stickers, advertiments hung on chain link fence — A lot to take in on one’s morning commute. One of the Midnight Montagier’s large collages, Bigelow Blvd. pedestrian overpass, 2018

There is a lot going on here. Three bleached-blonde bikini babes take center stage in the strange artwork, but each has her face plastered-over with a large sticker or morphed into freakish skeleton-like distortion. On either side, big colored cartoon-like images have been pulled from a big book, or maybe a glossy calendar, or poster–who knows? Surrounding all this is a riot of other, smaller imagery: faces, sections of classic paintings, pop culture icons, and recycled Hello, my name is identification tags.

The whole thing is probably six feet wide, mounted on cardboard backing, and has been zip-tied to the chain link enclosure on one of Bigleow Blvd.’s two pedestrian overpasses. It is not alone.

They appeared all at once, in one glorious technicolor explosion. At least, that seems like what happened.

One day–it was late June, 2018–these protected walkways were surprise-decorated (aka bombed) with more than a dozen giant collages, all in a singular style. Taken as a whole, the jumble of assembled images added up to a distended fever dream of dark cartoons, chopped-up advertisements, random photographs, and belongs-on-a-skateboard sticker art.

Attempting to discern meaning from any particular collage–let alone the installation writ large–is a fool’s errand. Sure, there’s plenty to work with if you really want to impose a theme on a collection of random Manga frames, postal slaps, and Obey stickers–but you’re not doing yourself any favors by wading into that particular murky sea.

One after another, attached to both faces of the chain link fence with zip-ties, the eye-popping pieces felt like the magnum opus of an artist (or artists?) who we’re calling The Midnight Montagier. (You know, from the French.)

Weeks, months, maybe years worth of work must have gone into hoarding visual imagery and curating the contents, the cutting-out and gluing-down. All this quiet energy was blasted out to the world–or, at least, the handful of pedestrians who regularly walk the overpass–in one giant salvo, three summers ago.

The pieces felt less like an organized statement of purpose and more like a compulsive saver finally admitting I’ve got to do something with all this stuff. There are worse motivations for artistic expression and many lesser attempts at beauty and/or messaging on city infrastructure.

The gift of these carefully created pieces to the few of us who experienced them before either nature or the Department of Public Works decided their time was up was fascinating and much appreciated.

With this much creative energy and such obvious dedication to the medium, the person or persons behind the Bigelow installation would have to strike again. Once they got their first taste of anonymous glory and release to the world, there’s no way they wouldn’t want to go back for more … right?

Well, we waited, we watched, and over the last three annums, we’ve trundled down every side street, back alley, bicycle lane, and flight of city steps the city has to offer, always looking, always searching. Days turned to weeks and months turned to years. But alas, that was it. The Midnight Montagier seemed to have saved it all up for a single epic go-down-swingin’ exorcism of every creative demon and each loose bit of visual ephemera to wash up on their desktop.

… until just last month.

Three years later the Montagier finally struck again! Why we didn’t run a piece on the collages at Bigelow back in 2018 still seems goofy, but perhaps the blogging gods knew there would be more to the story–we just needed to wait through a global coronavirus pandemic (Phase I, sigh) to get there.

Regardless, our old collage buddy returned–and in such dramatic fashion! In a similar kind of overnight secret art drop, new pieces arrived en masse across Lawrenceville’s utility poles, free publication boxes, and at least one mailbox early this August.

colorful collage of cartoon images, stickers, advertiments attached to mailbox — Lawrenceville, 2021

colorful collage of cartoon images, stickers, advertiments attached to utility pole — Lawrenceville, 2021

It took your author about two seconds to recognize the tell-tale blocky hodge-podge of colorful visual jetsam, this time glued to a utility pole on Butler Street. Other pieces were spotted in quick order–mostly along Butler Street, but also up the hill on Penn.

Several very rainy weeks on, the pieces are still holding up, if sun-faded and with some edge peeling. The style of collage is exactly the same, but the delivery mechanism has shifted ever so slightly. Gone are the big cardboard backings and loose zip-ties. These pieces are smaller, maybe 11×14–sized to curl around roughly a quarter of the big steel traffic signal poles–and glued or wheat-pasted directly to bare metal.

To The Midnight Montagier, Thank you for distributing your collections in such an exciting, egg-hunting, head-scratching way. For keeping the spirit of the street alive and coloring the world. For making the morning constitutional a mental exercise as well as physical. If you’d ever like to tell your side of the story, we’d love to connect. Until then, we’ll be looking out for you, at Midnight.

Beyond the Valley of the Doldrums: The Skunk Hollow Art Walk

May 2, 20218 Comments

paintings made from flattened tin cans nailed to a utility pole — “I’ll tell you what magic is … Love” / “The Hollow.” Unofficial tin can pole art welcome signage for the Skunk Hollow Art Walk.

There is a melancholy to the exhibition: themes of darkness, loneliness, one very literal cry for help. Among the images, you’ll find birds soaring in flight and stretched-out cats, abstractions and twinkling stars–but these are the exception.

If Orbit staff were laying out a catalog for the collection, our cover would feature the image of a single small piece installed on a utility pole. In it, a figure has been cut from a tin can lid and painted a rich spring green. The devil’s horns are bent and rusted and his eyes are cut out to make us believe we can stare right through the back of his cranium. In hand-lettered paint marker is a simple descriptor alluding to exactly that: A Lost Soul.

painting of devil made from cut steel can nailed to utility pole — A lost soul.

Elsewhere, there are instructions to Give yourself to the nite (sic.), a pair of unoccupied dinette seats, our favorite tin can pole artist’s tell-tale devils, martini glasses, hearts, and arrows. The artwork is made from recycled metal bits and bobs, a discarded cutting board, even the door from a standard-issue mailbox.

It is artwork from the trash bin, placed deeply out-of-sight–as if thrown into the void–and likely only ever experienced by fellow lost souls who hear the cryptic pieces whispering from cracks in the wood … or maybe that’s just the way it seems.

rusted painting on tin can nailed to utility pole — “Help me.” Ex-mailbox pole art.

painting on tin can nailed to utility pole — “All here (?) into the night.”

Skunk Hollow, the deep valley that separates Bloomfield from Polish Hill and North Oakland, won’t appear on any regional cultural guides; you’ll not find it featured in glossy magazines or listed among Pittsburgh’s next hottest neighborhoods. In fact, “The Hollow” doesn’t even show up on maps of the city (at least, not by that name). Its derisive title is merely a people’s collective dismissal of the out-of-sight/out-of-mind not-quite-a-real-neighborhood.

There are some good reasons for all this. Skunk Hollow hosts one of the more convenient spots in the city to illegally dump a La-Z-Boy recliner or an old television–plenty of people have chosen to do just that. The handful of businesses located along Neville Street are not what you’d call boutiques–they’re more of the rock-moving, general contracting, and looking-for-new-occupants varieties. Japanese knotweed has completely consumed the steep hillside and makes an effective trap for all of the blown-around street trash as it washes over Bloomfield’s banks.

rusted paintings on tin can nailed to utility pole — “And that nite, we raided the devils. Private stash needless to say.” / “We had a good ole time.”

collage of round-formatted street art attached to utility poles — Pole art in the round

So if the Convention and Visitors Bureau wants to pitch Skunk Hollow as a special place for out-of-towners to explore on their limited time in the ‘Burgh, they’ve got their work cut out for them.

But for those of us waking up ridiculously early, obsessively walking many mental health miles at daybreak, the Hollow is a welcome open air experimental art detour. Its randomly-curated works speak to the solitude of the early hour and themes of escaping into the night, tiny devils playing hell with our synapses, and you are not alone messaging make for a kind of communal balm for the disconnected.

small painting of camper trailer on wood screwed to utility pole — Camper trailer painting

The Skunk Hollow Art Walk is not what you’d call accessible. There is one big hill, one Y-shaped flight of city steps (we’ll get to those), and a road surface with no accommodation for pedestrians. Worry not, though, it’s unlikely you’ll see any other human beings–with or without vehicles–during the length of your visit. Walking in the street tends to work out just fine when you’re the only one there.

Viewing the environment on foot is an absolute requirement as all the little objets d’art are scaled for up-close examination and located in the kinds of niche spaces one must poke around thoroughly to see at all. One of the photos here (I loved kissing her in the rain, below) was achieved only by climbing up the hillside, bearhugging a utility pole with one arm, and then using the dumb selfie camera so I could get a photo of a tin can painting that I couldn’t actually see from my precarious position.

painting made from flattened tin cans nailed to a utility pole — “I loved kissing her in the rain.”

For the directionally-challenged, don’t worry about getting lost in Skunk Hollow. There is only one road that traverses the short distance between Bloomfield’s backside and the old Iron City brewery. In typical Pittsburgh fashion, it goes by three different names–Lorigan, Neville, and Sassafras–in its approx. 3/4 mile run.

Most of the art is found along sloping Lorigan Street, from the Ella Street steps down to the bottom of the hill, so a greatest hits visitor could drop in for some tin can pole art and still make it to Tessaro’s for an early dinner. But really, why not go “full Hollow” and walk the length of it. It’s a little more spartan at the bottom, but by the end you’ll be rewarded with some great wheatpaste pieces on the old brewery.

City Steps with graffiti reading "Try" on every riser, Pittsburgh, PA — Ella Street (aka the “Try Try Try”) city steps

metal toy truck screwed into concrete steps — The “Try Try Try” steps metal truck

The last time The Orbit reported from Skunk Hollow we were on the step beat, there to check out the great Ella Street (aka the “Try Try Try”) city steps. We’ll not go over all that here, but this bit of you can do it self-affirmation infrastructure is totally of a piece with the collection of street art that surrounds it.

What’s been added to the steps (since that 2015 story) is its own terrific set of oddball ephemera. The bolted-on scrap parts truck (photo above) is thankfully still there, right at the lowest landing. It’s been joined by a tiny sculpture of simple chairs, placards, handrail ramblings, one repurposed wooden puppet-like thing, and a mystery mailbox.

sculpture of two chairs anchored into public steps — Tiny furniture, big steps

metal piece with text "Dream 1: You had a whole lot of fun with a comedian ..." attached to public steps — “Dream 1: You had a whole lot of fun with a comedian …” Steps koan

graffiti painted support on public steps of waving figure — Art on the “Try Try Try” steps

A fancy art museum, this ain’t–but then again, no one visiting The Carnegie gets to experience the thrill of risking both poison ivy and tetanus in their bloodthirsty pursuit of new tin can pole art. As combined art happening/aerobic workout, Skunk Hollow is hard to beat. Plus, the hours are great and the price is right.

Yes, attendees of the Skunk Hollow Art Walk will have to negotiate some broken glass and a few salty words committed in spray paint on the jersey barriers along the roadside–oh, there’s also that mystery odor. But, like poking through a thrift shop or digging through used records, a visit rewards the patience of the art lover willing to do a little work for a commensurate dose of oddball magic.

handmade masonry gates to Iron Eden, Pittsburgh — The Seussian gates of Iron Eden, Lorigan Street

wooden painted board that used to read "LOVE" with most of the middle section removed — Ouch! There is no middle ground in love. Vestigial cutting board art.

collage of protractors glued to various walls and signs — Yes, there are Pittsburgh protractors in The Hollow

graffiti on pink wall reading "Stuck in the rain for 20 minutes on a 1 year tour of the USA" — If JYK could make Skunk Hollow a part of his American tour, you can walk down the hill from Bloomfield.

metal piece with words "Rusty love" cut out nailed to utility pole — Rusty (and muddy) love

Tin Can Pole Art, Part 2: A Date with Some Little Devils

June 3, 2018May 22, 20212 Comments

tin can lid painted with sad devil and the words "She's gone", Pittsburgh, PA

Hell & Oates^[1]: “She’s Gone”, Bloomfield

Farewell to all these smiling angels….I’ve got a date with some little devils.

That auspicious message, artfully paint-penned to the cut lid of a large-size steel can, is nailed to a wooden utility pole on South Aiken Ave. in Friendship. Immediately above it appears one half of another can lid, cocked upright, suggesting a single bunny ear–its mate either removed after-the-fact or just never made it to the pole the first time.

However nutty this inscription might seem, little devils are absolutely on the loose in the greater East End. And while pious Christians worry about getting right with God or facing Lucifer’s pitchfork in the keister for all eternity, the city’s devils clearly have their own concerns to stress over. Indeed, the red one appears on a couple different poles both broken-hearted and teary-eyed.

steel can metal painted and nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“Farewell to all these smiling angels….I’ve got a date with some little devils,” Friendship

She’s gone were the only two words Messrs. Oates and Hall really needed as shorthand to heartbreak–that, and close falsetto harmony over a slinky Fender Rhodes groove. Here, the simple message is a clue to the devil’s distress (above).

A cat-like devil has an inverted pink heart for a nose and a topsy-turvy screwed-up mouth (below, top). Those sad eyes may say just as much with no words at all. There’s one more teary-eyed devil, this time with cupid’s arrows literally piercing his visible heart (below, middle).

steel can painted with sad devil and nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

sad devil, Friendship

painting of devil with arrows piercing his chest, nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship [photo: Susan Peake]

“I try momma…”, Friendship

I try momma… implores a blue devil, rendered in stark silhouette and levitating an electric martini with one hand, the other raised in salutation (above). A different pole devil clutches the circle-A anarchy flag while waving to friends (below)–no doubt shopping for bargain Clancy’s chips at the nearby Aldi.

This same common imagery of devils, hearts, anarchy, and martini glasses showed up a couple times in our first story on tin can pole art earlier this year. These were clearly no coincidence as the themes get even more of a workout this time around.

metal can lid painted with devil holding anarchy flag nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

anarchy devil, Friendship

tin can lids painted and nailed to a utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“So lost … pray for me, I’m down,” Garfield

Somebody needs to get this guy into therapy! Or maybe we all just need to be better friends to the devils we know. Whatever it is, she’s gone and the plea to appease momma aren’t the only cries for help on the city’s telephone poles.

So lost…pray for me, Mom, I’m down reads a Garfield alley two-fer (above); the simple message Struggle, along with a fire-dancing, heart-balancing devil, turns up on a nice, rust patina’d single-color piece in Shadyside (below).

small painting of devil with heart on tin can nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Struggle, Shadyside [photo: Lee Floyd]

While that’s a lot of devils clinging to East End telephone poles, they’re far from the only specimens in this tin can pole art roundup. We also spotted a number of other pieces with the same stylistic DNA as the devil-doer dealt–we’re talking about the tell-tale cryptic calligraphy, hearts, flowers, martinis, and anarchy.

BUT…[yes, there’s always a big but] there are some outliers in the collection, too. We’ve seen the swirling, psychedelic television/VCR combo scrawled on all sorts of walls and dumpsters, as well as turned into back-of-sign decals. But this nice, two-color paint can lid outside The Glitterbox Theater (below) feels like a giant leap forward–even if the perpetrator still can’t get his or her mind off the TV.

tin can lid painted with TV and nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

North Oakland

steel can with painting nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“I try to stop…and smell the flowers (in life too),” East Liberty

“My worst enemy has always been time, 2001,” Friendship

tin can lid painted with abstract face and nailed to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Garfield

can lid painting of flower with crying face, Pittsburgh, PA

sad flower face, Bloomfield

tin can lid painted with the message "It's all I know", Pittsburgh, PA

“It’s all I know,” Bloomfield

tin can lid painted with indecipherable image and nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Shadyside [photo: Lee Floyd]

tin can painted and nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Shadyside (partial) [photo: Lee Floyd]

While asking one’s mother for her prayers may or may not be common practice, doing so via painted kitchen tool on side-street telephone pole seems an especially unlikely way to share one’s feelings.

As if parenting weren’t difficult enough, kids are always coming up with new ways to communicate. First SnapChat, now GreatChee. “How’s our youth doing, honey?” We imagine a clueless Dad asking, “Why, not so good,” the response from Mom, “Haven’t you checked East Liberty for cheese graters?”

painted cheese grater nailed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

cheese grater pole art! “Mom – pray for me”, East Liberty

There are also a couple more of these giant, five-gallon driveway sealant drum lids, tagged-up and screwed-into poles/trees along Spring Hill city steps. The pair clearly begs for a deeper investigation of the neighborhood’s walkways as we’re guessing these aren’t the only two out there^[2].

steel can lid painted and attached to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“I am home 16” / “free Rakan” / “R.I.P. Syzer”, Spring Hill

large metal can lid painted and nailed to a tree, Pittsburgh, PA

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Basin Street steps, Spring Garden/Troy Hill

Finally, a couple pieces that are absolutely metal and pole art, but don’t have their material origin in discarded soup cans. They’re a little off-topic, but we’re not going to sit on these waiting for a collection of stray non-tin can-but-still-metal pole art.

The triptych of embossed blank verse into sheet metal that hangs on a Harriet Street utility pole (below, top) gets high marks for its innovation in the genre, but the execution feels a little, you know, “smoke a little dope, skip a little rope”… but maybe this blogger just doesn’t get it, man.

Similarly, A boy from Frankford… (below, bottom) really feels like somebody who doesn’t know what he’s trying to do. Then again, I guess he says it right there: like anyone in the tin can pole art game, this “boy” is just trying to find his way.

metal sheets stamped with words and painted, nailed to utility pole in Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship

metal sheet painted, lettered, and screwed to utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“a boy from Frankford … trying to find his way,” Spring Hill

Thanks to Susan Peake for tipping us off to a number of the Friendship pieces and co-assistant cub reporter Lee Floyd for his work in Shadyside.

[1] Thank you, Chris Caldwell.
[2] Greater Spring Hill: if you spot more of these, let us know!

Memorial Day: Roadside Crosses

May 28, 20183 Comments

roadside memorial cross with Christmas wreathes, West Elizabeth, PA

Mark, 66-02, West Elizabeth

A simple cross. Each spar a length of white PVC pipe a couple feet long with the ends capped and sealed. There is one heavily-sun-bleached Christmas wreath attached to the piece and another lays in the grass just in front. Also at the scene is a small, hand-painted, ceramic angel. Peel-and-stick letters on three ends of the pipe describe only the most basic details: Mark, 66-02.

wooden memorial plaque with flowers for Vincent Lapko, Pittsburgh, PA

Vincent Lapko, Nov-30-1983 – Oct-7-2017, Homestead Grays (neé High Level) Bridge [photo: Lee Floyd]

Years ago, the makeshift memorial was hammered into the grass of a wide berm along Route 837 in West Elizabeth. We pass the cross on every trip down to Donora and Monessen, so it’s become a kind of mile marker in this industrial stretch that includes a number of small factory buildings along with large operations for Eastman Chemical Resins and Marathon Petroleum. The enormous, stories-tall gas reservoirs of the latter form an imposing backdrop to the very human-scaled and personally-tended roadside cross put up for the departed.

roadside memorial cross with fireman's helmet and the text "When I am called to duty", Homestead, PA

firefighter’s memorial, Homestead/Munhall

Memorial Day means a lot of things to a lot of different people. It was created to honor those men and women who’ve died in military service for the country and has morphed into the great long weekend of igniting propane under chicken thighs after deeply-discounted blowout sales at department stores and car dealerships.

While those interpretations of the holiday are all valid, The Orbit finds a profound depth in the very personal and extremely individual work of making and tending these unique tributes that seem to pop up just about anywhere.

roadside cross and wreath with lettering "Ryan 1998-2017"

Ryan, 1998-2017, Rt. 65

There’s a lot we don’t know…and will never know just by randomly passing a roadside cross with someone’s first name. Somewhere out there–for any accident that’s resulted in fatality–there must exist the blunt facts of a police record or newspaper obituary. But even with the clues provided–a firefighter’s helmet, a stone painted with the Harley-Davidson logo, an unexpected location along the bicycle trail–the memorials generate more questions than they answer.

hand-painted roadside memorial cross, state route 837, PA

Jordan Celovsky, 1988-2017, Rt. 837

Whatever happened to Mark, Ryan, Jordan, or any of the others remembered in these roadside crosses, it probably wasn’t a happy ending. Their ages–from late teens to mid-thirties–and placement of the crosses (mainly) along busy roadways suggest unexpected, unnatural deaths. These seem likely to be car crash-related, but of course those details are part of what remain a mystery.

The most important unknown, for the vast majority of us, is the character of these people whose lives were cut short on the two-lane blacktop. They were clearly loved and are missed with a reverence we should all be so lucky to have. The Orbit spends a lot of time in the graveyard; very few marble headstones get the loving upkeep of some of these lashed-to-a-guardrail wooden crosses.

Ronald Vahosky, Great Allegheny Passage bicycle trail

iron memorial cross with plastic flowers on utility pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Nick Fazio, 12/21/90-11/13/15, Bloomfield/Lawrenceville

Back to that anonymous roadside in West Elizabeth–graveled and dusty, noisy with truck traffic, and surrounded by the petrochemical industry. It has none of the solemn peace, flowering dogwoods, frolicking deer, or generations-old sculpted beauty of Allegheny or Union Dale Cemeteries. It offers neither the great cross-river views of St. John’s and Loretto nor the rock star lineup at Homewood.

But…this is where it happened. And for the people who loved Mark and Vincent, Ryan and Jordan, these lonely stretches of ex-urban highway seem to have become hallowed ground in a way that may never seem completely appropriate for more pristine, formal burial grounds.

* * *

metal cross attached to iron train trestle, Pittsburgh, PA

unknown, West Liberty Ave.

Roadside crosses, though not obviously memorials, showed up in a couple other places on our travels. These anonymous acts of faith–a metal cross on steel girder (above) and old world painted wood cross on utility pole (below) come with even less to go on.

Do they remember a specific traffic fatality like the more personalized examples above? Or do these crosses have nothing to do with an individual or specific intersection and just represent a quiet-but-public expression of religious belief?

wooden cross attached to utility pole, Pittsburgh

unknown, Lawrenceville

There’s a couple more here, too. This loving, heart-shaped and patio-sized tribute to “mom / grandma / friend” on Route 51 is hard to suss out. Did grandma pass away at this stretch of highway [it’s as likely as anywhere] or did the family just decide to landscape their elaborate memorial in a naked roadside where the greater Coraopolis/Moon Township commuter community could pay their respects? Who knows!

mom / grandma / friend, Rt. 51

Finally, the one that really hits home. We wrote a while back about the ghost bicycle for Susan Hicks in central Oakland and went into a whole spiel about putting our faith in robots. We’ve been fortunate enough that there haven’t been too many other cycling fatalities in the city since then.

One painful exception is Dennis Flanagan, a cyclist who was killed riding on a fast-moving stretch of West Carson Street in 2016. For the ghost bicycle left to mark the spot of Flanagan’s fatal accident, the teddy bears have faded, plastic flowers droop, gears and chain are rusty. But the painted-white bicycle remains, locked to a street sign faithfully reminding passers-by that Dennis Flanagan was here and we all need to look out for each other. That’s what Memorial Day means to me.

ghost bicycle memorial decorated with plastic flowers and stuffed animals, Pittsburgh, PA

ghost bicycle, West End

Born Again: The Babyland Totems

March 4, 20182 Comments

sculpture of black plaster head with fake white hair and flowers attached to utility pole

street totem by twilight

Those eyes! Wide open, wild as the wind, staring straight back at–no, through–you. The steely glare cuts right into the cold, dark, February night. Evocatively–as if arranged by set designers on a commercial shoot–the ice blue of those peepers echoes the color of rain-slicked Negley Avenue reflecting the deep indigo sky above. It’s only just six o’clock, but it may as well be midnight.

sculpture of black plaster head with flowers attached to wood

bean baggie baby on board

The Babyland Totems don’t always look quite so startling. But even in broad daylight they’re an exciting and unnerving collection of figures to come across purely by accident. Most of the little objets d’art feature plaster cloth-formed humanoid faces, painted either black or brown, and decorated with curly hair, red lips, and, of course, those pale blue eyes.

Each of the softball-sized heads projects from a bundle of colorful fake flowers within a decorative cloth wrap that serves as the little icon’s body. Random accessories–a beanbag, plastic barrettes, a toy army tank–make their appearances, too.

sculpture of black plaster head with fake flowers

verbena tiara

The effect is very much that of the youngest babies, released from the womb, wrapped in swaddling clothes, and surrounded by the magic and love of a new life. It’s hard to tell how content these little fellows are–some appear to be smiling, for sure, but others are mid-scream. We’ve all seen real-life infants taking the same wide range of emotions.

plaster head with fake flowers resting on brick window ledge

window ledge widow’s walk

At the same time, one cannot help but think of these as memorials. Close one eye, tilt your head, and almost every one of the totems takes the form of a simple cross. That familiar shape, the reverent individual attention, and those pink, white, and purple flowers remind us of fresh decorations on grave markers or the all-too-common roadside crosses that appear seemingly out-of-nowhere on the berms of highways and grassy undergrowth along busy through-streets.

The Orbit has spent enough time in and around graveyards to know that grounds crews routinely flush these kinds of plastic flowers–along with the accumulated teddy bears, deflated balloons, and past-date holiday decorations–a couple times a year. If some of Allegheny Cemetery’s fall cleanup ended up here–instead of the landfill–well, we can’t think of a better (re-)use of the material.

skull’s out for summer

Babyland, the all-things-newborn supply shop, served Pittsburgh’s East End for over sixty years^[1]. For anyone who was in the area before, say, the late oughts, you’ll not soon forget the circular cartoonish images of babies pulling their own diapers down that used to decorate the outside brickwork. Those were replaced by actual photos of super cute tykes not too long before the business closed in 2012. The squat retail space at the corner of Penn and Negley has been sitting vacant ever since.

Unlike some places in town, this will inevitably change fast–in fact, it’s amazing the little building at this prominent intersection hasn’t been razed for the next set of Legoland condos or a fluorescent-lit fast casual chain restaurant already. Development has come loud and hard to East Liberty and the Penn Avenue corridor and we all know there’s plenty to memorialize even where it hasn’t actually happened…yet.

sculpture of black plaster head with golden hair and flowers attached to utility pole

totem/pole

The other obvious–and most important–side to all this is the continuing story of displacement and eviction of East Liberty’s population. From the old Babyland location, one merely has to look east, across Negley Ave., to see a completely denuded landscape where the big Penn Plaza apartment complex stood for the last 50 years. The fallow ground is now an otherworldly red-brown as crushed brick mixes roughly 50/50 with barren soil.

Had the Babyland artist wished to eulogize Penn Plaza instead, he or she couldn’t (at least, not in the same way)–there’s nothing left to even hang a piece of artwork on. [In fairness, there is one set of steps, their handrails, and a full perimeter of chain link fence–but you get the idea.]

stairway leading down to large empty lot

former Penn Plaza apartments lot, East Liberty

In the last two years, Penn Plaza has gone from a large, lived-in pubic housing complex to a mountain of upturned brown brick to the big muddy field it is today. For those of us who didn’t live there, the transformation may have been startling, but we see this kind of ruthless, scorched-earth demolition and redevelopment happening all over.

But for the S’Libertarians whose friends and loved-ones moved away, who saw their community disintegrate, or worst of all–personally suffered the loss of a family home–the upscaling/gentrification/whitewashing (take your pick) of East Liberty has got to pack the same savage punch as a hurricane or tornado blowing through other parts of the world, dismembering the lives in its path.

sculpture of black plaster head with plastic toy tank attached to wood

Babyland: tanks for the memories

Without any better information to work from^[2], all we can do is speculate and enjoy the Babyland totems while they’re still around–and they probably won’t be here for long. Like the former retail building they’re installed around or the old Penn Plaza apartments, something will take them sooner or later. Whether that’s a designated city clean-up crew, street art souvenir hunters^[3], or just a heavy blast of rain, we can’t predict. But it’s another of life’s constant reminders that everything–even a big multistory brick and steel apartment complex–is really just here for a snap of the fingers or a blink of one of those haunting baby blue eyes.

playing cards wrapped in twine hanging from cowbell

the old Babyland, hanging by a thread

A note on the photos: These pictures were all taken on Feb. 13 (daytime) and Feb. 14 (evening), 2018. We have it on good authority that at least one more totem was part of the original installation, but it had disappeared by the time we got on the scene. Within a few days of the 14th, the two pieces from the plywood over Babyland’s Penn Ave. entrance [“bean baggie baby on board” and “tanks for the memories” (our labels), above] were also removed.

sculpture of black plaster head laying on wet sidewalk concrete

head down to Babyland! ^[4]

[1] “Longtime East Liberty business Babyland to close and move”, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 8, 2012.
[2] In the course of reporting this piece, we located the artist who created the Babyland totems and made several offers to discuss the work. The artist declined to be interviewed for this story and since there’s no attribution on the individual pieces, we’ve decided to preserve that anonymity.
[3] The Orbit adheres to a strict code of preservation of street art so we do not condone taking pieces such as these for personal consumption.
[4] After finding this lost noggin on the sidewalk, we did our best to reattach it to the rest of the piece using a twig to join the two. How long that lasted is unknown.

Tin Can Pole Art

January 14, 2018May 22, 20212 Comments

tin can lid painted with heart and text "I love you Pittsburgh. Goodbye." nailed to telephone pole. Pittsburgh, PA

“I love you Pittsburgh. Goodbye.” Lawrenceville

Such a lovely farewell kiss. The severed lid from a steel can–it looks like it was from one of the big 28-ouncers like you get tomatoes in–tacked into the rough wood of a Lawrenceville telephone pole. Painted onto the flat surface is a decorative white heart with the simple, touching message I love you Pittsburgh, Goodbye.

Less romantic, hypochondriac Orbit readers may get hung up on the totem as a sharp-edged breeding ground for tetanus–but don’t fall for it. The anonymous artist has left this Easter egg high enough off the street and applied it securely to the pole in a way that no one will be injured, unless they’re really trying. On the contrary, this little rusting love letter may just save a life.

abstract painting on unrolled steel can with message "We gave this place our best shot and no matter what happens now ... it was worth it & we made this work.", Pittsburgh, PA

“We gave this place our best shot and no matter what happens now … it was worth it & we made this work.” Shadyside

rusted tin can with painting of a skull, nailed to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

skull can, Oakland

Someone’s out there, taking those most lethal occupants of the recycling bin and having a fine time dismantling the component parts, flattening them into two-dimensional work surfaces, and turning the little pieces into cryptic pictograms and coded messages, hidden-in-plain-sight curios and tiny objects d’art.

You may have walked by some of these a hundred times and never noticed. At just a couple inches wide, the little artworks are especially well-camouflaged against the deep brown tarred wood of the telephone poles they’re displayed upon, quite often out of eye level at the peak of arms’ reach.

tin can flattened and painted, nailed to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

A Friday night “to-do” list: love, anarchy, the devil, and a martini, Bloomfield

Cut tin can painted with text and nailed to telephone pole. Text reads "Back then, if it exploded, we laughed", Pittsburgh, PA

“Back then, if it exploded, we laughed”, Shadyside

Whether we’re talking about one lone assailant or a whole gang of tin candidates is anyone’s guess. Besides a few name-like tags [J.A.K.; KYT; Nick (damn); Leroy…are these real people?] there is no attribution here to work from.

That said, many of these specimens have common elements. First, let’s just start with the genre. It’s a niche market, for sure–ex-food container nailed to telephone pole. Second, there’s proximity–all the ones we’ve encountered are in the same one or two square miles between East End neighborhoods Shadyside, Bloomfield, Garfield, and Lawrenceville.

Most importantly, though, the apparent paint pens, handwriting, style of dotted lines, arrows, and indecipherable messages is even more precise. Several of the tiny artworks contain the same iconography of a glowing martini glass, heart, anarchy circle-A, and devil figure.

small painting on steel can of devil with the text "I choose...", Pittsburgh, PA

“I choose…”, Shadyside

small painting on steel can with text "to follow my heart...up the mountain, or...", Pittsburgh, PA

“to follow my heart…up the mountain, or…”, Shadyside

There are some definite outliers in the field. Another large can lid spotted in Shadyside is painted with a night scene featuring a blue river valley between green fields and trees (below). The original pastoral feel has now been accidentally transformed into a scarier, menacing landscape as seasons of rust creep through to the surface. It’s also worth noting that this lid was attached with a pair of Phillips-head screws rather than the full-perimeter flat tacks we found on the other pieces.

painting on steel can lid of night landscape, Pittsburgh, PA

night scene with river, trees, and green grass, Shadyside

tin can lid painted with text "Me vs. Time, KYT, '02" nailed to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“Me vs. Time”, Garfield

Lastly, there’s even a sub-genre to this already arch form. In a couple places, we came across the big steel can lids with their flared attachment edges and gaping mouth holes that make them look like absurd anthropomorphized flowers. We imagine these come from five- or ten-gallon bulk-size containers of asphalt sealant or roofing tar–but haven’t actually ID’d them yet.

It’s a considerably larger canvas to work from. The wider-than-the-pole size likewise shouts out at the passer-by, where a soup can is more of a whisper. I’m not sure these two examples (below) tell us much about the form, other than we like the possibilities and we’d love to see more of them in action, out in the wild.

round metal lid painted with long string of text nailed to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

“You spin me right round…”, Duck Hollow

cardboard "Clarence the Bird ... Make the World Beautiful" artwork stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

big lid painting [plus Clarence], Friendship

Clarence the Bird Takes Bloomfield! Part 2: A Beautiful Friendship

March 24, 2017March 25, 2017Leave a comment

"Clarence the Bird" hand-drawn artwork stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship at Gross

Nevertheless, the bird persisted.

Call the little guy flighty, fragile, scrawny, left-leaning (or, at least, always left-facing), single-minded–heck, even a broken record! Sure, he could stand to put on a few ounces and what’s with that damn flipper-flapping all the time–give it a rest! Whatever you do, though, you’ll not call Clarence the Bird anything less than thorough.

Friendship at Stack Way

Friendship at Choate Way

When last we left the little fellow [Clarence the Bird Takes Bloomfield! Part 1: Millvale and Beyond, Pittsburgh Orbit: March 19], Clarence’s spring fever was in overdrive, nesting his feathers and pointing his beak throughout Bloomfield–down Millvale Ave., in the warren of cattywumpus alley-streets west of Edmond, and up by the Penn Avenue Aldi.

Impressive, for sure, but those sightings were merely the appetizer for the grand buffet that is Clarence’s A Beautiful Friendship campaign.

Friendship at Ella

tiny paper drawing of Clarence the Bird stapled to tree stump, Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship between Ella and Dupont Way

Friendship at Dupont Way

From the dense row house heart-of-Bloomfield all the way out to where Friendship Avenue becomes Friendship neighborhood, Clarence has left a bread crumb trail in cardboard and paper stock, fine-tipped ink pen and crude Sharpie. The tiny original artworks have been stapled, tacked, faded, torn, and (I’m sure) disattached and absconded-with. But the pieces still hanging-around–and there are a lot–look great covering (nearly) every single block up and down the long street.

Here then is the latest from The Orbit‘s Clarence Tracker 2000^TM logging of Mr. The Bird’s Friendship Avenue activity, starting on the Penn Avenue/Children’s Hospital end and working east as far as South Pacific.

Clarence the Bird artwork stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship at Taylor

Friendship at Dryden Way

Friendship at Pearl

Friendship at Edmond

Clarence the Bird original artwork stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Friendship Park

Friendship at Mathilda

Friendship between Mathilda and Edmond

Friendship at Millvale

Friendship between Winebiddle and Gross

Friendship at Winebiddle

Friendship at Winebiddle (partial)

Friendship at Evaline

Friendship at Pacific

Note: There are even more Clarence the Bird “droppings” on the eastern end of Friendship Ave., between Pacific and Roup (at least), but the ones we found there were previously reported on in our story Birdwatching: Clarence the Bird Watching [Pittsburgh Orbit: Jan. 5, 2017].

Clarence the Bird Takes Bloomfield! Part 1: Millvale Ave. and Beyond

March 19, 2017April 30, 20171 Comment

South Pacific Ave.

Talk about a one-track mind! Freakin’ Clarence the Bird–him with his beaky-ass schnoz and big pointed wings looking more like fur than feathers. You try changing out of your gym clothes in that get-up–young fowl are merciless! Ah, Hell–he’ll get over it. All the dude has on his tiny noodle is trying to make the world a little nicer place, and he’s not afraid to tell you that…over and over and over again.

Clarence may be thinking big picture, but he sure follows through by, as they say, acting local. Lately, the little guy has been choosing to spend most of his time in just a short one-mile stretch of Bloomfield and on towards Friendship.

Millvale Ave.

We first caught wind of his latest pole-tagging spree down at the south end of Millvale Avenue, right by Sonny’s Tavern and the bridge to Oakland. It turns out Clarence was working his way north with almost one occurrence every block up to Dog’n’Burger. A second jag took Ol’ Big Wings down Friendship Avenue, even stopping for a tiny taste of sidewalk stump. (A stump!) Yes, a stump. [We’ll get to Clarence’s full-on assault of Friendship Ave. in part 2.]

There’s not a lot more for this blogger to say, except Clarence: we’re with you, dude. Keep on doing your world-beautiful avian thing. We’ll keep looking out for you and you know The Orbit‘s got your little bird back.

Millvale Ave.

cardboard Clarence the Bird drawing stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Millvale Ave.

paper Clarence the Bird drawing stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Millvale Ave.

Torley Street

Elk Way

Clarence the Bird drawing stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

State Way & Lima Way [note the bonus back yard Marys!]

Clarence the Bird art on telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Edmond Street

All the wing-flapping and telephone pole loitering must work up a mighty hunger–even a tiny bird’s gotta eat too, right? C. the B. must have the same hankering for foo-foo brunch every other hung-over dog-chewed playboy and day-glow choreographer seems to get. Hey–eating seed is for the birds! Whatever.

We spotted a couple-a-three recent-ish Clarences down on Lawrenceville’s main drag, including a pair of very nice two-color (black-and-white) drawings on brown bag (?) and one of his rare, text-only Make the world beautiful signs. Go ahead and get you another plate off the buffet, Your Birdness–it’s been a busy couple months and this gloomy world could use a fresh coat of paint.

Butler Street

See also:

“Birdwatching: Clarence the Bird Watching” [Pittsburgh Orbit Jan. 5, 2017]
“Put Clarence the Bird On It” [Pittsburgh Orbit March 2, 2016]

Birdwatching, Clarence the Bird Watching

January 5, 2017March 14, 20172 Comments

Clarence the Bird artwork stapled to wood covering empty storefront, Pittsburgh, PA

Penn Avenue, Garfield

Traditional birdwatching likely takes place at a more inviting season. Not only is it nicer for the spectator to be outside in a warmer, drier climate–one filled with the bright colors and in-bloom flora of the other three-quarters of the year–but (we assume) there simply must be a lot more birds to look at.

This blogger imagines typical northern birders–just like baseball fans–consider winter the long dark off-season. Weather and the absence of fowl require avian fanciers to temporarily retire binoculars and sun visors, instead spending their time curled up by the fireplace leafing through back copies of Birder’s World magazine and plotting strategies to snare an up-close photo of the green-winged teal, surf scoter, or greater white-fronted goose when the season turns.

Clarence the Bird artwork stapled to empty storefront, Pittsburgh, PA

Penn Avenue, Garfield

Friendship Avenue, Friendship

So it’s a right fine unexpected treat to spot the friendly face and outstretched, oversized wings of Clarence the Bird peering back at you as a fellow makes his or her rounds throughout the day. There he is, tacked to a telephone pole on a residential throughway and mingling with the high-minded street art on Penn Avenue.

For the most part, we didn’t get too close. Not wanting to scare poor Clarence out from his various perches, we caught him here in the wild, hiding amongst the traffic signs, crumbling plaster, and effluvia of street handbills and stray graffiti.

Clarence the Bird artwork stapled to former storefront, Pittsburgh, PA

Penn Avenue, Garfield

cardboard sign with pen drawing of a bird and the text "Clarence the Bird...", Pittsburgh, PA

Main Street, Lawrenceville

This blogger knows what you’re thinking: Someone sure missed the memo on that whole flying south for the winter thing, right?

Certainly, even in these darkest, gloomiest, and most dreary of days, Clarence the Bird eschewed a sun-filled January of jello shots in Daytona Beach or working up a savage tan in Belize to instead rest his wings right here at home in the East End. Whether Clarence is a loyal Steeler fan hoping for the best in the playoffs or just too lazy to make the trip south, we don’t know. Either way, we’re betting he’s regretting that decision right about now. That said, The Orbit is selfishly very happy he stuck around.

Penn Avenue, Garfield

Friendship Avenue, Friendship

Like the Pittsburgh protractors–or men wearing Zubaz–once you start looking out for Clarence, he’s everywhere. On cardboard with crude Sharpie and in fine lines on card stock and curlicues, Clarence gets around. This most urban of avian creatures loves to nest in the protective plywood covering abandoned store fronts on Penn Avenue, mingling with wheat pasted street art and course slurred graffiti. On one Main Street pole, Clarence isn’t even present but has left us a bold-faced title card with his name followed by a tantalizing ellipsis begging the question where is Clarence the Bird and what is he up to?

Clarence the Bird artwork among collage on empty storefront, Pittsburgh, PA

Penn Avenue, Garfield

cardboard sign with the words "Clarence the Bird..." stapled to telephone pole, Pittsburgh, PA

Main Street, Lawrenceville

The last time we crossed paths with Mr. The Bird he was urging us to Make the World Beautiful in three of four consecutive Butler Street telephone pole hang-outs. After migrating up the hill to greater Garfield/Friendship*, Clarence seems to have both cloned himself many times over and abandoned the explicit message almost entirely. [The one photo included above is the only exception we spotted.]

While this blogger still agrees with the sentiment–and misses Clarence’s fine calligraphy in the inscription–it’s safe to say that actions speak louder than words and Clarence is out there doing his best to decorate the landscape without ever having to brag about it. You go, bird!

Clarence the Bird artwork stapled to info kiosk, Pittsburgh, PA

Fourth Presbyterian Church, Friendship

Fourth Presbyterian Church, Friendship (detail)

* The way Lawrenceville rents are going, we can’t blame the guy.

Pittsburgh Orbit

With the inevitable presence of no-goodniks

Tag: pole art

Send In The Crones

Collage Dropout: The Return of The Midnight Montagier

Beyond the Valley of the Doldrums: The Skunk Hollow Art Walk

Tin Can Pole Art, Part 2: A Date with Some Little Devils

Memorial Day: Roadside Crosses

Born Again: The Babyland Totems

Tin Can Pole Art

Clarence the Bird Takes Bloomfield! Part 2: A Beautiful Friendship

Clarence the Bird Takes Bloomfield! Part 1: Millvale Ave. and Beyond

Birdwatching, Clarence the Bird Watching