Never let it be said that I only discuss my failures. Today I am proud to announce the success of what I've been calling Secret Project #2.
This is the finished version, as created by the wonderful people at
Traffic Safety & Equipment Co. Rick, Fred, and Bobby were all very patient with me and my frequent calls to see how things were going, and helpfully answered all of my stupid questions ("What's a standard construction sign size?"). (The photo is also, if you look closely, a self-portrait of the Artist in His Backyard.)
I'm not sure what the genesis of this project was, other than I've been thinking about Danny and his installations in Brooklyn. His style and my desire to pull drawings off the paper and get them out into the world have been percolating in my head for a while now and two of the ideas I've been kicking around I've been referring to as Secret Projects #1 and #2. This is #2. I designed the drawing in Adobe Illustrator. This is the original design.
This was fabricated as a standard construction sign, two feet by three feet, aluminum, with reflective film. I released it into the wild Saturday, October 23, 2006, as you can see in this onsite photo.
I'm very pleased with how it came out. Some small lessons learned from this: First, I need a digital tablet. The lines on this sign were nice enough for a proof of concept, but I want to do them better next time. And second, highway signs are huge. Up close, my sign looked pretty big, but once I installed it, it was totally dwarfed, as you can see, by the other signs. They just don't look that big from the street.
I've got some more I'll be working on soon. For now: success.
