Art Car Liftoff on New Year's Eve

My Art Car project debuted on New Year's Eve at Pittsburgh's First Night Parade, and has come to a close! Here are some photos of the cars. (See my previous entries - Part 1 and Part 2 - for more information about how these are made and why I chose to make a car about cranes.)

Each year has a different theme for the parade. This year's was Special Delivery, and each car was introduced with its own banner to emphasize the theme.

First, I had to assemble my cranes, which were stashed in my trunk, and choose their positions on the top of the car. The secret to keeping the cranes upright in their "flight" position was impaling them on short rods of bamboo, which were stuck into braces that we taped to the roof of the car. The braces are in this photo sitting next to the rear tire - basically they're a T-shaped assembly of 2x4s with two holes for the rods to fit into. Two holes, rather than just one, kept the cranes from rotating on their stands (something I didn't think of - this is why it's helpful to have an engineer troubleshoot your designs!).

After the 2x4s had been attached, we put on the slipcover and poked holes in it so that the cranes could sit in their hidden weights.

My friend Kelly Blevins (also an artist - check out her work here) lent me a hand with assembling the cranes and also marched in the parade alongside my car.

Here we are ready to go in front of my car! (I didn't get to march in the parade. I drove the car - very carefully - with the assistance of Kelly and my husband Dave, who spotted me and held those crane puppets.)

There were four other cars as well. Here's Jenn Bechack's deer on a vision quest:

Holy toast:

Don Orkoskey's Dr. Who car, complete with TARDIS:

And an alien spacecraft landing on Earth:

Lastly, here's a picture of the car in the parade, with me inside. 

This was a very fun and unusual opportunity, and I have many people to thank for helping me get this idea off the ground (har) and into reality - Cheryl, the brains behind this operation; everyone who helped out on Art Car weekend, especially Jenn, Sarah, Rose, Karen, and the Pietrusza family; Tirzah, for the intense amount of planning and food-gathering that helped make this a really enjoyable and smooth experience; Kelly and Elena, for marching with me in the parade; and Dave, for his work constructing and assembling the cranes and their support system. Thank you all, and Happy New Year!