Friday, July 30, 2010

A Lovely Pastoral Scene @ the Gum Wall


A Lovely Pastoral Scene @ the Gum Wall
Photo & Text © 2010 Kim- Seattle Daily Photo. All rights reserved; no use, alteration, reproduction or republishing in any media.
I've shown you many gum wall shots over the years. The ever evolving participatory art installation that the Market Theater Gum Wall in Post Alley has become is currently sporting these monumental snow-capped mountains beneath a brilliant sunny sky. A happy human takes a sroll along a river that turns and cascades into a waterfall. There is a striking red heart outlined in black above, while below to the left the declaration, "No one's gonna love you more than I do" is spelled out in stretchy gum letters. Anyone care to guess how much time it took to chew all the gum used in this pastoral mural, and how many individuals participated. I'm thinking if it was just one or two people that they were standing there the better part of a day to create this. I shot this late at night.

Update 8/6/10: Okay, don't blame me for not giving. . .ah. . . a "closer" inspection or, (ew!) touching it to find out, but looking at this again now I'm thinking someone cheated and used plastic modeling clay-- you know, the bright kid's clay that smells of petroleum and never dries. At least I don't THINK anyone would spend the money for Fimo or Sculpty for such a space. The more I think about someone chewing that much gum and the specific colors used, the more I'm thinking someone "cheated." Ah, evolving art! We need a curator to inform us what subtle and not so subtle changes this space undergoes :-). Or maybe a 365 Gum Wall Project or a web cam to know what really goes on.  -K.

7 comments:

Maya said...

Looks like Switzerland. Happy Swiss Day!

lewi14@gmail.com said...

Wow. Cool. It's sort of surreal!

brattcat said...

Oh, my jaw aches just looking at this.

Anonymous said...

I could be off on this, but I wonder if the words aren't a reference to the Band of Horses song "No One's Gonna Love You". I believe that the band was originally from Seattle.

Kim said...

@ Anon: Thanks very much for the background info. I think I heard this band once, but I'm not familiar with the specific song. For anyone wanting info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Band_of_Horses.

Kim said...

Okay, don't blame me for not giving. . .ah, closer inspection or, (ew!) touching it to find out, but looking at this now I'm thinking someone cheated and used plastic modeling clay. You know, it's the bright kid's clay, the kind that smells of petroleum and never dries. At least I don't THINK anyone would spend the money for Fimo or Sculpty for such a space. The more I think about someone chewing that much gum and the specific colors used, the more I'm thinking someone "cheated." Ah, evolving art!
-Kim

Pauli said...

my fiance made this & dedicated to me! it used to have our names in the red balloon. he didn't "cheat", he said he picked off gum from the wall and spent about 8 hours putting this together! I have a photo of it on my wall :)