Free Sign Project - notes
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notes
Free signs are signs that say "free" and are free for the taking.
Free signs are hand painted on salvaged scraps of wood and other materials. In the first instance, a number of signs were placed in a location and advertised on the web using a customized Google map (see below). In Montreal a sign was made in situ at Monastariki and left behind. In Winnipeg, signs were made and left in an abandonned shopping cart in the Point Douglas area of downtown. In future iterations, signs may be improvised in situ. In Toronto, on the occassion of Nuit Blanche signs were left in a shopping cart on the entrance deck of the arts building 401 Richmond St. W.
What is freedom? The freedom to elect one or another party that represents basically the same thing? As the poet said, if you stay being the same thing for long, it starts to feel like prison.
Not the least amusing aspects of this project are the high degree of randomness, the hasty craftsmanship and the laughable attempt to produce a saleable product. But seriously, the sign-making craft is apropos the commercial/non-commercial questions raised by the work, as is the fact that the works are given away: their "value" is determined wholly after the works have left the artist's hands, which has traditionally been how the art market works.
Some free signs too big and dirty for interior display:
on Picassa.
Read more about freedom on Wikipedia.
Yam Lau, In My Neighbourhood - The Convenience Gallery, in Espace Scuptur, Summer 2008
"In my opinion, Robert Labossière’s project, entitled Payday, currently on view during the time of writing this text, is especially successful. Labossière dressed the storefront gallery with the familiar neon signs and graphics that are typical to a cash store. At first glance, this mock-up can really fool the eye. It is entirely plausible that such a store could be operating at this location. Parkdale is a low-income neighbourhood and there are certainly a number of cash stores around. It is understood that this type of “cash store” blatantly preys on the financial predicament of the “have-nots,” trapping them in a permanent cycle of debt. In fact, Labossière is reacting to the fact that two such cash stores have recently opened in his own neighbourhood, just a little east of Parkdale. Hence, Payday, a strategic doubling of the stereotypical cash store, indexes and intensifies the perversity of such an operation. When approached in close-up, the viewer can read related statistical information presented on panels that are not obvious from afar."
View Larger Map
Yam Lau, In My Neighbourhood - The Convenience Gallery, in Espace Scuptur, Summer 2008
"In my opinion, Robert Labossière’s project, entitled Payday, currently on view during the time of writing this text, is especially successful. Labossière dressed the storefront gallery with the familiar neon signs and graphics that are typical to a cash store. At first glance, this mock-up can really fool the eye. It is entirely plausible that such a store could be operating at this location. Parkdale is a low-income neighbourhood and there are certainly a number of cash stores around. It is understood that this type of “cash store” blatantly preys on the financial predicament of the “have-nots,” trapping them in a permanent cycle of debt. In fact, Labossière is reacting to the fact that two such cash stores have recently opened in his own neighbourhood, just a little east of Parkdale. Hence, Payday, a strategic doubling of the stereotypical cash store, indexes and intensifies the perversity of such an operation. When approached in close-up, the viewer can read related statistical information presented on panels that are not obvious from afar."
View Larger Map