Wednesday 18th May 2016
It's a running joke about motels and hotels that they are the patron saints of terrible artists. Nothing caps off the perfect cheap room like a terrible painting, whether it features sloppy brushwork, lazy composition or just general bad taste. Often, the cheaper the room, the cheaper the painting, and there are some very cheap motels out there..
This joke has been ongoing so long that one of the biggest motel chains in the United States decided to have a little bit of fun with it as part of their latest rebranding effort. Super 8 is a fairly wide-ranging chain across North America, and they are probably one of the largest purchasers of truly awful art in the world (aside from our elderly relatives) - but that isn't going to work with their newest plans.
WIth all this in mind, they partnered with star comedian and author Amy Sedaris in a joke art show, where the old pieces that graced the walls of Super 8 rooms across the continent will be given away free, first come, first served. Of course, that's assuming anyone would actually *want* them. If so, the comedy/art show will be held in New York City at the Openhouse Gallery.
"That art could not be uglier. The hardest thing I ever did in my life was to come up with names for it all. That was really hard. You're just looking at something, and I don't know what to call it — 'That (expletive) Duck' — mindless art," she explains.
The plan for the new art apparently will be to avoid the generic nature scenes and pastoral hilarity that covered the walls in the past, and replace them with scenes that reflect the actual location that you're in. When every motel room looks like the same, it can be rather disorienting to wake up in a room after a long trip and suddenly lose all sense of where you are.
No matter what you think about the art, it's impossible to deny that they have a sense of humour about it. Wouldn't it be nice if hotels and motels around the world suddenly became some of the foremost patrons of the arts? With the rise of AirBNB and similar crowdsourced accommodation websites, it's possible that an individual proprietor's sense of taste would work in their favour, as good art can help attract clients - rather than just make them laugh.
Posted on May 18th 2016 on 02:00am
