Seen that? That's the artwork of one Joseph Carnevale. He's a kid from Indianapolis living in Raleigh who, one day sitting in class, cooked up the idea of taking the traffic barrels that line every fucking street in the Raleigh-Durham area and turn them into this giant piece of barrel art that you see before you.
Here's a bit of extra information for you. North Carolina has the laziest fucking barrel reclamation program that I've ever seen. Years after a road project is done down here, there's still barrels everywhere. So, it's not like you couldn't just go and find some replacements real easy-like.
So, here we go. We've got this barrel sculpture thumbing a ride during morning rush hour, and people are all honking and stuff because they think that shit's funny and creative.
Raleigh police, apparently, weren't as amused as most everyone else. Perhaps they confused it with a giant snow cock or something, because they immediately knocked it down, disassembled it, and released the hounds so that they could find the "criminal" who took approximately $365 worth of barrels and cut, painted and bolted them together.
Warm up the tar and get the feathers ready, we've got some southern justice to mete out. The owners of the traffic barrels, Hamlin Associates, liked the magnum opus canali (translated as "great work of barrels"), going so far as to describe the work as "good". Hamlin Associates have no desire to press charges. Hell, it was like free advertising for them. They've easily recouped the monetary damages.
In fact, they'd like Monsieur Carnevale to reconstruct the Barrel Monster for in the lobby at their headquarters.
So, where's the problem, officer?
Laura Hourigan, who seems to be a barrel of laughs herself, serving as a spokesman for the Raleigh police department went on record as saying, "The police department obviously has a job to do. And, if someone is going to destroy property, we're going to take care of the situation."
No word on whether Sheriff Taylor let her put her bullet in her gun before she made that bold proclamation.
Meanwhile, two years after it happened, the murder of Jenna Nielsen remains unsolved...
23 hours ago
12 comments:
Reminds me of the Heidelberg Project back in Detroit. Some guy painted a few houses funky colors and put up lots of metal sculptures, and then the police nearly started a neighborhood riot when they went in to tear it all down.
We are getting all the trappings of totalitarianism, just a few more baby steps now...
The Raleigh-Durham and Omaha areas have something in common. I've decided they leave the barrels, because it's only a matter of time before they tear apart that same stretch of road yet again. Probably cheaper to leave them, then it is to pick them up and put them back later. :-)
The Barrel Monster is awesome! I want!
That Barrel Man is awesome. I hate when people don't have a sense of humor.
Jeeeez. Uptight much?
The problem here is that the offender was from Indiana. You know how the Southerners feel about Yankees. Let alone Hoosiers.
And he didn't use a cone and two flashing yellow strobes for the old twig and berries, so what's the fuss?
That monster dude is AWESOME!!
America needs to ease up sometimes, especially if the company didn't have a problem, and no accidents were caused (I swear, billboards are more of a distraction).
That's something I'll never understand.
I've got a murderess next door living with my G-pa and it's been...oh...about 7 years now since she gave her husband the ole' arsenic cocktail.
Yet, the police are all about chasing down teenagers for defacing road signs, etc. What a bunch of crap.
Mr. Carnevale can hang out with me any ol time he wants... matter of fact I'm gonna go out tonite and steal a bunch of traffic cones and barrels, just to impress him, maybe build a little shrine...
"you talking to me?"
Eh boy.
i read about this too! that sherrif is an ass. isn't that always how the police talk when they don't have anything better to do?
Well, we all got to have priorities I guess. Remind me if I ever go on a bank robbing or car jacking spree to do it in Raleigh-Durham. Looks like my odds might be better there.
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