After we saw kinship of the remarkable side-by-side toilets we saw in a public bathroom to Marcel Duchamp’s famous urinal, we realized that we frequently stumble on objects and sightings that are powerful ready-made artworks unto themselves. If we saw them in a gallery, we’d marvel, or at the very least ponder them, in the way we do “real” art.
Our current favorite is an abandoned building we often pass in our Harlem neighborhood. The vines have been ferociously, in the loveliest way possible, consuming the building to become a structure only of vines, with perfectly delineated outline of fire escape…. Who could have envisioned such a thing in their mind’s eye?
We love that we all have the opportunity to discover them; such readymades are hiding in plain sight everywhere. We have only to look around…
We searched for a vine haiku that might accompany the wonderful found art. And found them in the Everyman’s Library Pocket Haiku.
They needed only a couple of changes…
A hundred different
gourdsvines
From the mind
Of one vine.
—Chiyo-Ni
…
The
hangingsuspendedbridgefire escape
Creeping vines
Entwine our life.
—Basho
Beautiful. A wonderful find. Thank you
Ohhhh lovely.
My favorite thing about vine-covered walls/homes/etc is when you get close you can often see the little ecosystem it’s created – little lizards, spiders, etc. Also, the way the little vine tendrils seem to defy gravity and reach outwards is so wonderful…