Last night, in the wee hours of the morning, I installed the signs pictured above all along 13th Avenue in the Cathedral Village neighbourhood of Regina. The intent was not to insight fear or worry, nor was it to announce some religious perspective on our fate, but rather to point out the simple fact that despite all the growing concerns about our future on this planet, people often remain indifferent when faced with impending danger.
Environmental instability, water shortages, natural disasters, a fragile economy, global pandemics, threats of nuclear or bio-chemical warfare, the alignment of the planets throwing the earth off its orbit, a giant meteor hurling itself toward us, intensified solar flares scorching the earth and all life on it, 2012, Armageddon, Divine Intervention, and a growing number of conspiracy theories pointing to secret government agendas and devastating invasions from other worlds or dimensions. These are just a few of the seemingly countless threats or cautionary signs we are constantly bombarded with that suggest the end of the world as we know it might soon be upon us.
Signs of “The End” is a public art installation made up of a series of paintings stylized to resemble various types of street signs, and is intended as a light-hearted commentary on society’s short-sighted and always predictable inclination to ignore even the most dire of warnings. And while some of those warnings listed above likely deserve more of our attention and response than others, the fact remains that no matter how pressing the issue might be, the majority of the population will always remain largely apathetic. Therefore, although each of the installed pieces is literally a sign announcing “The End”, these signs themselves should not be interpreted as being literal, but should be understood as symbols of all those greater signs and portents that consistently surround us and assault our conscience.
The installed signs will be abandoned by the artist, leaving it to the public to respond to as they see fit. By placing the signs in locations that are obvious and even sometimes obstructive, the artist is thus enticing the public to physically engage with the structures and force a response one way or another. The idea is to get people to at least acknowledge the "signs", but to also stimulate discussion, and, hopefully, convince the public to take some form of action in response to the signs.
The signs will be installed along 13th Avenue for all the public to see, but how many people will really take notice? After all, it's easy to dismiss any kind of warning when it’s overshadowed by countless other distractions, and especially so with a society that shows it is becoming increasingly indifferent. The point of this project was not the signs themselves, but rather the reaction they hoped to create. Each sign holds out an invitation to the observer to be proactive and to respond to the sign in a very real and physical way: To take it for themselves, to own it and keep it as an art piece, or ,if preferred, to destroy or dispose of it. The key is to just do something, anything, that would suggest that in seeing and acknowledging these "signs", one has been swayed to action. What action is taken doesn't really matter, so long as it's action and not simply a response of apathy or indifference.
This morning when I walked down the street to the progress of the project, all but one sign was removed from it's place. When I walked down the street later this afternoon, I was pleasantly surprised to see many of the signs gone.
For your interest I've included some photos from last night, documenting the installation. My apologies for the quality of the photos, I was trying to be quick and sneaky when installing the work, and I wanted to avoid using the camera's flash so as to avert any unwarranted attention to my activities:
