Impaling Cars in the Name of Art

Friday, 9th January 2009 by

While driving along Telephone Road in Waikato, New Zealand, you may notice that someone appears to have tried to park their car on top of a large tree stump.

This doesn't seem to be an officially sanctioned public artwork, but rather the work of either a kindly local patron of the arts (or possibly just the result of incredibly bad driving).

This mysterious artwork reminded me of Spindle in Illinois, a sculpture consisting of 8 actual cars impaled on a 15m spike, which we looked at from above way back in 2006, but which has since received an inspection by the Street View camera.

Back in 2006, locals informed us that this work of utter genius was under threat from those who, incredibly, felt it was an "eyesore"! The debate raged on until May 2008, when Spindle was sadly dismantled and scrapped.

All may not be lost however, as the top two cars (a 1967 Beetle and a BMW donated by the man who commissioned the artwork) were actually saved from being scrapped - in the hope they might one day be re-used as part of "Spindle 2"!

Is there a petition we can sign somewhere?

Thanks to John Burns