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AIRPOET, 1979 Manipulated roadsign in Adelaide, South Australia. The first of the Roadsigned series.
Artist statement:
"With the AIRPOET sign, I went out at midnight and climbed onto the roof of my car -- on a busy industrial road near where I was then living -- and traced the 'R' of AIRPORT, and went home to my supply of reflective tape (yes, I'd bought some scraps from a sign company) and made an 'E' in that typeface, and put it onto a rectangle of blue of the right size. Then I drove back -- by now it was 2 or 3 am -- and carefully placed this onto the sign. It was anonymous, and of course illegal. The next day when going by I was shocked to see how wonderful it looked. Suddenly the mundane road carried a sign to the heavens. This 'interrupted' sign lasted for more than six months before being 'fixed', and was accepted as a local gesture. I know this because one day I was photographing the sign and a man was walking past -- wearing blue overalls, a box of lunches from the deli for his workmates under his arm -- and he said: "Photographing the sign, are you?". I said "Yes, know anything about it?". "It's a worker's Christmas present", he said.