Art by the side of the road: hot and not (1 Viewer)

[frona]

I know whether something looks cool/nice/interesting is not the way to rate art, but I'm going to do it anyway. Here is a roundup of some of the artstuff I've been seeing around the country lately. I'll do the bad ones first so I can end the post on a happy note. Warning: These locations can be vague and I don't know the names of any of the artists.

Bad:

• Lots of posts stiking up out of the ground which as you move along get taller and eventually "turn into" a brightly coloured, windmill/St. Bridget's Cross looking thing, then they turn back into just posts. On the motoway outside Dublin on the Limerick side. Ugh.
• Stupid, metal wire cylinder thing cut in half so that one semi-circular metal thing lies at either side of the road. Just up the road from the previous one, towards Dublin I think.
• Horrible spikey metal bird on top of a post in Birdhill

Good:

• Stone bull and man statues with one at either side of the road. Somewhere between Nenagh and Kildare.
• Beehive huts outside Drogheda
• Coloured animals (horses and cows I think) at two locations around Limerick City
• The "Roadball" outside Dublin

What art by the side of the road do you like or hate?

 

[classic seanc]

The horse in Horseleap!

 

[Corey]

I know whether something looks cool/nice/interesting is not the way to rate art, but I'm going to do it anyway. Here is a roundup of some of the artstuff I've been seeing around the country lately. I'll do the bad ones first so I can end the post on a happy note. Warning: These locations can be vague and I don't know the names of any of the artists.

Bad:

• Lots of posts stiking up out of the ground which as you move along get taller and eventually "turn into" a brightly coloured, windmill/St. Bridget's Cross looking thing, then they turn back into just posts. On the motoway outside Dublin on the Limerick side. Ugh.
• Stupid, metal wire cylinder thing cut in half so that one semi-circular metal thing lies at either side of the road. Just up the road from the previous one, towards Dublin I think.
• Horrible spikey metal bird on top of a post in Birdhill

Good:

• Stone bull and man statues with one at either side of the road. Somewhere between Nenagh and Kildare.
• Beehive huts outside Drogheda
• Coloured animals (horses and cows I think) at two locations around Limerick City
• The "Roadball" outside Dublin

What art by the side of the road do you like or hate?

Same.

That was fun.

 

[therealjohnny]

I quitel like the ceili/session band at the roundabout where the border checkpoint used to be in Strabane

Huge metal fiddle player, piper etc

Like these guys

Theres a big Stag somewhere too that keeps getting its gonads cut off

hes cool too

 

[frona]

Here's a small, bad quality pic of the Limerick cows. Some feckers attacked them and bashed them up a while back. Senseless thugs, grrrr.

 

[Corey]

The Elk on the road into Mallow.

 

[therealjohnny]

I like the Our Lady, pagan idolotry promoting shrines all over the countryside

Donegal is full of them

 

[frona]

That's kind of more "folk art" I suppose. They are pretty mad though. I love when they have neon halos!

 

[therealjohnny]

Kind of "mass produced in a factory" art

I love them for thier sheer weirdness

Round my way poeple still gatgher there for rosaries

 

[george mcfly]

there used to be a great 'man walking dog' statue out in sallynoggin

after the first day, both the man and the dog had drawn on dicks and the dog had a smoke

 

[Space]

Bad:

• Lots of posts stiking up out of the ground which as you move along get taller and eventually "turn into" a brightly coloured, windmill/St. Bridget's Cross looking thing, then they turn back into just posts. On the motoway outside Dublin on the Limerick side. Ugh.

• 
  
  That's actually a wierd depiction of a horse jumping over hurdles. You have to look at it as one as you drive by. I kinda like now that I know what it is.
  
  

  I quitel like the ceili/session band at the roundabout where the border checkpoint used to be in Strabane
  
  Huge metal fiddle player, piper etc
  
  hes cool too

  
  They're great, indeed, they are.

 

[frona]

That's actually a wierd depiction of a horse jumping over hurdles. You have to look at it as one as you drive by. I kinda like now that I know what it is.

Sounds like a recipe for crashing yer car. I don't know how to drive though so I'll give it a go next time. I don't know if I'll be able to get over the annoyance I've been feeling though in the last year of having noticed that thing!

 

[therealjohnny]

Does terrible/magnificent garden statuary deserve its own thread or can it go in here?

You know the stuff, the eagle at the gate is most common

I remember daytrips to Bundoran as a kid and what struck me was the amount of mad statues people had in their gardens

the best was this tiny garden that had a lifesized showjumper on horseback in mid vault


that trip was my Vegas

 

[Space]

Sounds like a recipe for crashing yer car. I don't know how to drive though so I'll give it a go next time. I don't know if I'll be able to get over the annoyance I've been feeling though in the last year of having noticed that thing!

I think it works better if you sorta glance at it while driving (not that I drive). As far as I remember I was half asleep on the way to Cork when looked up briefly and it all made sense.

 

[theoootini]

every new road project in Ireland has a budget for a piece of art...phact. i think they're a good addition to new roads.
its true though, some are horrible. i absolutely detest those cut out animal ones on the way to limerick. that mallow stag was pretty cool until he got covered in the mallow/cork colours.
ha ha his balls keep getting chopped off? betcha they'd look great mounted above the fireplace.

 

[Denny Oubidoux]

on the wesht side of the toll plaza on the the new motorway to kinnegad theres a stupid looking polo mint shaped metal thing on one side of the road and on the other side theres the polo mints hole bit, like the bit that use to be in the middle of the ring on the other side. i dont like it at all. they really wasted their art budget on that.

what i do like though is gods art in places like west cork, kerry, wicklow and places - mountains, oceans, windy mountain roads, that sorta thing. theres a deadly grotto on valencia island up above a quarry.

 

[Space]

I quite like this thing the "Pole Star" on the roundabout on the way into Letterkenny.

 

[CITY BABY]

heres a storey thats so irish it'd bring a tear ta yer eye

Im originally from athlone and as ya may or may not know athlone is half in co.roscommon and half in co. westmeath. about 10 or 12 year ago when a new dual carrige way was built ,the Roscommon co.council commisioned a sculpture for the side of the road,it was a "modern art" interpretation of the storey of the children of lir, anyways even though it was paid for by the roscommon co council, it fell under the durastiction of the athlone urban district council, of who all the members would be from the westmeath side. they decided it would look better the other end of the road, so in the middle of the night the sculpture was up-rooted, moved across the shannon and placed firmly on the westmeath/leinster side. there was obvious up roar from the rossies but tis still on the westmeath side to this day!!!!

 

[Denny Oubidoux]

heres a storey thats so irish it'd bring a tear ta yer eye

Im originally from athlone and as ya may or may not know athlone is half in co.roscommon and half in co. westmeath. about 10 or 12 year ago when a new dual carrige way was built ,the Roscommon co.council commisioned a sculpture for the side of the road,it was a "modern art" interpretation of the storey of the children of lir, anyways even though it was paid for by the roscommon co council, it fell under the durastiction of the athlone urban district council, of who all the members would be from the westmeath side. they decided it would look better the other end of the road, so in the middle of the night the sculpture was up-rooted, moved across the shannon and placed firmly on the westmeath/leinster side. there was obvious up roar from the rossies but tis still on the westmeath side to this day!!!!

it'd be ridiculous to have it on the roscommon side since the children of lir were from westmeath anyway. more the mullingar end though. i propose it be relocated on the mullingar bypass - i dont think theres any art there.

 

[bohs punks]

theres a deadly silver metal tree near clonroche wexford