January 14th saw the installation of my neon text piece 'I'M IN LOVE WITH THE MODERN WORLD' on the pediment of the 99p Stores in Cleveland Park Avenue, Walthamstow, London E17.
It's the latest installation for Street Gallery, the Waltham Forest Council's funded programme of art interventions.
The illuminated artwork, which is 26 ft long, takes a line from 'Modern World', a song by the American singer/songwriter Jonathan Richman, a song described by the Guardian journalist Laura Barton as 'one of the most magical in existence, a pean to the modern world, to the urban landscape'. I agree.
In another of his songs, 'Roadrunner', Richman sings 'Gonna drive past the Stop 'n' Shop/With the radio on/I'm in love with Ma**achusetts/And the neon when it's cold outside/And the highway when it's late at night/Got the radio on'. Richman's urban, everyday world of highways and bright lights and shopping malls is a world I respond to very powerfully, and neon was the obvious medium for my piece. Then Cleveland Park Avenue site in Walthamstow was perfect too.
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