Jalopnik
Mary Carothers and Sue Wrbican are our kind of artists, having dedicated much of their efforts towards the issue of mobility, landscape and the influence of the automobile upon American culture. Their latest project explores, among other things, the transition from the late 1970's into the Malaise Era of the early 1980's as epitomized by the Chevy Nova, which was replaced by the less than stellar Chevy Citation. The monument to this change will be a 1978 Chevy Nova frozen into a block of ice at Michigan Tech University on Michigan's Upper Peninsula.
Can we avoid a world cluttered with boring, underpowered subcompacts but still avoid destroying the environment? Or as the artists put it: "The Frozen Car points to the classic struggle of culture versus nature. It is a monument to a tragedy meant to remind us of our present choices." Below our conversation with the artists.
We spoke with the artists via telephone as they warmed up from a day out in the bitter cold prepping the base for the placement of the Nova. When we first saw the project we feared that perhaps it would be merely a simple visual meant to criticize the car culture we hold so near and dear. We were therefore quite pleased to find out that both artists are car fans and are taking a thoughtful approach to examining the same conflicts we explore often on this site (the Nova belonged to one of the artists).
Mary and Sue, who met at the Rhode Island School of Design, have worked together for a while and therefore have a habit of finishing the other person's thoughts and sentences. Because of this we've formatted the interview as both were talking at the same time instead of separately.
Why freeze a Nova in a block of ice?In the past we've done some projects involving blowing up cars and working with fire. What started as a comment has turned into an inquisitive investigation and we started thinking about it more seriously and started thinking about what metaphor the car could describe.
We love cars and for a long time our work has referenced mobility. We were also very fascinated with the metaphor and the car in American culture; that it's power and that it's freedom and now we're questioning those things. We tend to question our behavior at the same time we enjoy our behavior. That's just part of our inquisitive nature. We're critiquing the culture at the same time we're enjoying it.
(SUE) For me, this is kind of personal. When I was a baby I guess I had colic really bad and the only thing that would quiet me down is that my parents would have to drive me around at night. Cars have always been a pacifier in a way, a really elemental thing. I love to travel and mary does, too.
You're taking out the motor and a lot of the interior elements, is that an aesthetic or symbolic choice?
Technically, I think it will help us position the car because it will be much lighter... environmentally it's also a little more sound that the fluids aren't going to leak. On top of that it won't cloud the ice. Any dirt that gets in will affect the clarity. I think we also like the idea of the car being a shell as a metaphor.
(The artists also pointed out that getting someone to do all the mechanical work for free is tough and the people in the Michigan Tech engineering department were more than happy to barter the work for the engine.)
How did you end up choosing Michigan Tech?
Last year we worked with the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and they designed a refrigeration system and as much as we loved the work... we realized it would be very costly and we didn't want to have a fabricated solution to our problem. [Also] U of M did a study and realized that Detroit didn't get cold enough to get the ice that we needed. We wanted to do this by natural means and that meant we had to come further north.
[Mary] met an alum from Michigan Tech and he said it's really cold up there and you might want to contact the engineering department. They invited us to come up and with no skepticism said it's cold enough to do anything up there.
What's your ultimate dream for the project if you weren't hindered by supplies and funding?
What we'd really like to do is put it on a train while it's a frozen block and bring it to Detroit and watch it thaw. We think having a frozen Nova on a block of ice on the railroad car would look awesome. It would be suspended time in motion and it would be in the heart of the American auto industry. It would be ideal.
With the help of the Michigan Tech engineering department and students from Hancock High School, the car is set for freezing starting this Friday. The goal is to have the car frozen in time for the MTU Winter Carnival in early February. As the project continues we'll bring you updates from the frozen front lines. You can also follow the action on the Frozen Car Blog and Frozen Car Website.
Photos provided by the Artists
Comments
They totally should have used a white Fox body Mustang convertible.
I like this project. To complete it they need to sell the hubcap on eBay and blow up the computing device they used to sell it.
Dude...It's got Stripes! It MUST be a SS.
A Malaise-mobile sheathed in ice. The fact that the interior and engine is removed speaks for the auto industry of the time, merely a shell with no heart or soul to speak of. Its frozen tomb is a metaphor, that the technology simply stood still during this time period, neither advancing nor regressing despite the historical crisis automobiles were facing in the '70s. The construction, or rather deconstruction, of the car by the engineering dept of a major university is a tribute to hopefulness, to show that the future of automobiles is not bleak and that past mistakes can be immortalized and become a lesson for those who will eventually build and design.
yeah. i was an Art History major.
Hey...
At least they didn't pick the '78 Chevy Monza.
The auto really is a huge part of the U.S. and it's development. Our cities really didn't explode and mature into their modern form until we were able to expand the interstate system. Unlike Europe, whose roads were first developed to accomodate the horse and cart, ours were built to accomodate a full sized automobile and/or a rail system. The rise of the big-ass American car and SUV was inevitable because our roads provided the perfect natural habitat.
As tech improves I hope we're able to keep large cars on the road without the costly environmental impact. And just like the artist, I remember being a small kid riding around with my dad in his 1976 Buick LeSabre, a car that would be later given to me as my first real auto while I was in high school. It was the first car I ever took pride in. Big American cars are a big part of who I am. There are alot of people on this website that knock big Uh'merkin cars, but I have to admit, I'm a fan and I probably always will be. Of course I don't drink the Kool-Aid indiscriminately, but a properly designed large American car is my brand of coffee. So excuse me while I take my big, 6' 220 lbs American ass, and drop it in my 300CSRT8... because that's who I am.
Yeah... I know it was built in Canada, but it was designed in Detroit.
well, since we were told in the 70s that we were entering an ice age, freezing a malaise nova sounds about right. maybe al gore could globally warm a hummer for a future exhibition.
i think i just found a way to make al gore even more boring--watch him pre-heat an oven one tenth of a degree per year.
OMG! at my alma matter!
They went to RISD? Go Nads!
I heart Nova Week.
GREAT! I was wondering what would be the best car to rent for my [www.icehotel-canada.com] vacation...
Please tell me David Blaine is inside please tell me David Blaine is inside please tell me David Blaine is inside.
Dammit!
I think a Pontiac Fiero or a Malaise-Era Firebird might've been a more ironic choice.
What a bunch of dumb f***ks!
Great. Now what I need is a HUGE tumbler and a railroad tanker car of Tanqueray or Beefeaters gin. Oh, and stuffed olives. Lots of them, the biggest ones you can find...
@smokeydog001: A well-reasoned critique you've got there.
I love the visual parallels this could draw between the popular mammoth frozen in ice image.
For extra points, they should bury it in a cave in Siberia for future civilizations to find.
That's nothing. One snowy December at Cleveland Hopkins airport I too got a frozen Nova. From Hertz.
@Papercutninja: Wow, thanks for sucking the joy out of my day with that eerie (yet apt) description. They should hire you as a Dementor or something.
Kiddin'! But I still would want to see this in person; depressing metaphors aside. Plus, my friend goes to RISD, so go 'Nads indeed.
When the blower motor failed on my 78 Nova it too was frozen.
I hated that car.
It wasn't a 'hate' like you hate the ex girlfriend who ditched you after prom for some guy who dropped out of school three towns over and bought her menthols, more of a 'hate' like that reserved for any movie with Barbra Streisand.
I find myself looking on Ebay for a 78 Nova. I think it might be a complex you give yourself, like an abused wife who can't tell her husband not to beat her. It was as if every morning I got up for school my car was upset at me for running my mouth and Kerpow, I somehow snagged the parking brake cable on something and have destroyed a brake drum.
I will never trust GM again, and it is all due to an underpowered malaise inline six piece of rusted crap with a soggy carpet and chrome more pitted than all the armpits in China.
I think a car from a dead brand would be more appropriate. Something from the AMC, Eagle, Plymouth, Geo, Asuna, Isuzu, Daewoo, MG, Triumph or Rover brands.
Sue is one hot czech.. er chick!
those two have done lots of cool stuff--
blowing up cars...
setting couches on fire
putting up wiggy road signs-- you have seen in emails before...
check out the links
[www.cepagallery.org]
[www.nolo.tv]
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HUH?
I'll have to find out where they are doing this. It would be pretty cool to see.
@LTDScott: Only if a bunch of British guys have already frozen a Ford Capri in ice better than these women will.
good one
@Papercutninja:
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