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Billboard is a project I have had in mind since I started planning my last body of work, Dreamland,
in 1999. In late 2000, after the completion and exhibition of Dreamland, things finally came together to make this project
possible. Billboard takes my work further in examining the commodified realm of advertising and corporate worship that surrounds
us and bites at our heels from day to day.
Billboard is a mixed-media work made to resemble a double-sided,
highway billboard. Standing six feet tall by eight feet wide by three feet deep, Billboard consists of a wooden stand and
frames (built by me) which contain two four foot by eight foot paintings mounted back to back. This piece is capped off with
two functioning lights that illuminate each painting - the advertising area on an actual billboard.
I
have always been fascinated by the roadside billboard and see it as a type of a cultural lighthouse that guides us through
the highway wilderness. Billboards are the corporate world's way of saying: “We will still be here when your trip
is done”. I also like the cold glow that billboards give off on a dark night. They give one a strange sense of calm
and reassurance. A sort of “consumer candle” to curse the darkness.
The two paintings
in Billboard contain the same image seen from opposite viewpoints. Panel one depicts a couple seated in a mini-van seen through
the front windshield. Together they gaze into a crystal ball containing a car ignition key. Behind them is panoramic view
of a city skyline and a street with many cars and pedestrians. Panel two shows the same couple seated in the same mini-van.
This time they are seen from the back seat. They gaze into the same crystal ball with the same key but this time their outside
environment has changed from a city scene to that of a twilight desert-scape like the type often seen in the average car commercial.
This piece is the first in a series of works I am currently planning The Magic Hour which will deal with
car culture and auto advertising. The effect of the car on North American society is obvious and I hope to explore some of
the ways that cars and car advertising shape our mental picture of the world. Billboard deals with the car-commercial fantasy
of the pristine and picturesque wilderness at odds with the reality of the car1s actual place in the crowded city and on the
gridlocked highway.
Billboard will be shown in my April exhibition Decade at the Diane Farris Gallery
in Vancouver. The exhibition is made up of highlights from my work from 1990 to 2000. Billboard represents my first
work of this new decade and century.
Filmmaker Bob Fugger and Origin Pictures are producing a short
documentary film, Chris Woods: Billboard, which will document my work on the project. It is set for release in 2002. December,
2001
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