Albuquerque Tribune, The (NM) August 10, 2001 Joy ride Author: Jeff Commings JCOMMINGS@abqtrib.com / 823-3625 Page: C1 Estimated printed pages: 7 Article Text: Antlers. Cracked shells. Godzilla rampant. Any and all elements transform clunkers into wheels of squeals. Brown minivans and cloned economy cars parked in front of the Harwood Art Center on Seventh Street Northwest are overshadowed by a pickup truck covered with circuit boards and a station wagon covered in wine corks and bottle caps. A truck with a metal shark fin and another covered in beads and children's toys jockey for the attention of slack-jawed onlookers. Homemakers in conservative garb, shy children unsure what to make of the two rows of cars beaming in the hot sun and a seen-it-all reporter gawked in the presence of these cars-turned-conversation-topics. Jocelyn Roberts, one of about 20 who turned out for the recent Route 66 celebration, says she knew art cars existed but never knew so many of them roamed Albuquerque's streets. "It's kind of strange and cool to see this stuff," she says, her hand lightly grazing the surface of each car, afraid to damage the goods. "If I had one, I don't think I would have the nerve to drive it every day." A few cars away from Roberts, Rick McKinney drifts from car to car, admiring the quality of each and conversing with artists and spectators. He's in his element. Every day, McKinney 34 years old with a ponytail and a scraggly beard drives his art car, Duke, around town. Once an all-too-mundane maroon '76 Ford Granada without a roof, Duke is now, at this moment, the shining spectacle of the art car gathering. Kids beg to climb inside this interactive museum. Adults keep a tentative distance as they hear McKinney describe the car. Most days, Duke is very likely the most visible vehicle on the road. And McKinney is equally visible in Albuquerque's art car world. For the dozen or so New Mexicans who drive vehicles that combine convenience with eye-popping visuals, the common bond among them is their desire to express their individual personalities in a cookie-cutter society. "In making any art you're expressing yourself," McKinney says. "My car is one-of-a-kind, like my fingerprint is one-of-a-kind." * * * Talk to McKinney about just about anything and he gravitates back to details on the 10 years of his life spent creating a vehicle that, upon hearing his story, has been his best friend. After joining a caravan of art cars from Southern California to Houston, McKinney became engulfed immediately in the art car world. "The trip opened my eyes to what I could do with my car," McKinney says, who always comes up with new ideas for some part of Duke. "I loved the people and the sense of community." McKinney got an idea about Duke's most distinctive feature during a move from Oregon to Southern California. Looking at the pile of footlockers stowed on the top of his car, he envisioned what has become Duke's tower/observation deck/sleeping space made mostly of footlockers and featuring a plastic viewing bubble, which doubles as a skylight. Since many people are instantly curious about Duke when they first encounter the art car, McKinney decided to permanently attach a book on the trunk detailing Duke's life. Through a battle with depression and lean years where Duke doubled as his home, McKinney says the car was his saving grace. "The car," McKinney says with a reflective pause, "was really helpful in reminding me of what was important in life making people smile." McKinney's girlfriend, Karen Wetherill, is an entomologist at the University of New Mexico. Since studying bugs is her passion, she applied various artificial creepy-crawlers to the frame of her 1990 Mercury Tracer. More than 200 bugs, including a replica of Hopper from "A Bug's Life" the size of a finger, completely cover the car. But Wetherill says her work is not done. "I don't know if many art cars are finished," says Wetherill, 28. "I think most of them are works in progress." She says she and McKinney constantly change Duke's look as well. "It gets addicting," McKinney says. Over the years, Duke has weathered many transformations. McKinney first let friends and kids put various shades of paint onto the body. Then it evolved to its current cornucopia of items: antlers and troll dolls on the hood, children's stuffed toys on the rear bumper and various trinkets from McKinney's past in the interior. On the car's exterior, the former newspaper reporter and novelist decided to attach a typewriter as a hood ornament to signify his former life. (Right now, McKinney is looking for a job.) McKinney says that he knows of 10 or 11 art cars in the Albuquerque area. In other parts of the country, though, he says art cars are rarely seen. He often takes Duke on road trips, usually to art car gatherings and historical monuments. In May, Duke participated in the Indy 500 Festival Parade with a few other art cars. "People here at least are familiar with art, and most people have seen an art car," McKinney says. "In Indianapolis, they have never seen anything like this. They went crazy. We were completely outside of their thinking." McKinney mentioned cities like Houston, San Francisco and Seattle as more common meccas for art cars fanatics because of their annual conventions. Thanks to people like McKinney, Albuquerque's art car population has attracted a recent swell of attention from the public. Spectators at the Harwood gathered around Duke and the other cars and either laughed in disbelief or seriously analyzed every detail of the construction. Donald Baca was armed with a camcorder to capture the essence of the art cars. After talking with the creators, he decided to take up the hobby himself. "I've got an old Chevy in my garage that just takes up space," says Baca, 44. "I think I might try my hand at this." A construction worker, he sees art as a form of expression. "That saying about dogs looking like their owners works for art cars, too," Baca says. "The cars seem to be a reflection of who these people are or at least want people to think they are." For beginners like Baca wanting to jump into the culture, several documentaries by art car enthusiast Harrod Blank circulate on documentary channels, and a coffee table book on art cars around the nation will be published in August. Not all art car owners are first-timers like Baca. Like Madonna and Cher, Kathamann chooses to use a singular moniker. The 52-year-old part-time artist has regular gallery showings of her paintings and sculptures in Santa Fe, Taos and Santa Cruz, N.M. She bought her 1973 Karmann Ghia brand new and did nothing to it for more than 25 years. But 20 months ago, the Santa Fe resident started decorating the inside of her car with artifacts from her stint in Afghanistan as a member of the Peace Corps, plus a rosary and gaudy and glittery jewelry bequeathed to her by her mother. "It's not something I would wear, ever," she says. Then came the shells. At first, she put mussel shells on the roof, but the heat was destroying them. So she moved them to the inside roof of the car. Now she has a collection of other shells from the shores of New Jersey, Florida, Jamaica and Ireland coating the exterior. Some of the shells which she adds are inherently feminine are beginning to crack, but Kathamann has many more waiting to replace them. Last year, Kathamann's finished project was featured in the Santa Fe Fiesta Parade. "A lot of people were interested in seeing the car because it was different than the normal stuff that's usually in the parade," she says. At the art cars gathering, Kathamann was more a delighted spectator than exhibitor. When a new creation would drive into the parking lot, she would break off a sentence and shriek with delight and amazement at the art on wheels. Kathamann says the public's reaction to her car is equal to how she feels when she sees an art car roll into view. Although she says she only takes the car out for a drive once a week "just to kick the motor around," she is always greeted with enough responses to treasure until her next drive through Santa Fe. "Usually it's just the thumbs up," she says. She says a lot of the time people stop to snap a picture or comment on the coolness of a crustacean-covered car. Wetherill, owner of the bug car, says the reactions she gets are more interactive. "When you're going 55 on the highway, traffic gets backed up because people are pacing you," Wetherill says. Wetherill relates a story she experienced while driving. "I pulled up to a stoplight and some woman next to us goes to her daughter in her minivan, 'That is the tackiest thing I've ever seen.' "I was just like, 'Well, you're driving a minivan.'" If Wetherill walks into the grocery store, there are usually a couple of youngsters trying to pry off a bug when she walks out. "Kids don't usually pull hard enough to pull them off," Wetherill says. "And when they do they get so upset they just stick it back on and run away." Michael McCants, 13, is one kid who doesn't need to pull stuff off other people's art cars he has one of his own. When he was 10, his mother, Carol McCants, wanted to paint their brown 1979 Honda station wagon a more visible color. Michael suggested a trip to Wal-Mart for paint instead of Earl Scheib. In 1998, he painted aliens on the hood of the car in preparation for their trip to Roswell for the 50th anniversary of the UFO landing. During the festival he extended his paint job to the doors. On each side of the car are highly imaginative and detailed scenes of his favorite monster, Godzilla, in a battle royal with his famous foes. The drawings were recreated from sketches Michael made on paper. He also painted tiny eyes on the back and a pair of large pupils near the tailights, which his mother says has met with scary results. "We drive this car every day . . . and people say 'Your car is staring at me!'" says Carol, letting the kid in her overpower her motherly nature. "I think that's cool." In keeping with the alien nature of the car, Michael removed all Honda emblems and replaced them with UFO signs. His mother even had a fake license made to allow her to drive the UFO car. "It says I'm even allowed to abduct cows," Carol says. True to the art car artist's spirit, Michael's work is never done. His next plan for the car still a dark chocolate brown on the few untouched spots includes painting the solar system on the roof. Hearing him talk about it, you'd think Michael was the next Michelangelo. "We're just trying to find a way to get up on the roof to paint downwards," Michael says. * * * Art car owners may be expressing individuality, but people like McKinney hope people seeing Duke or any other car for the first time have some kind of reaction to it. "About 95 percent of people like my car, and 5 percent hate it," McKinney says. "And that's good, because they're feeling something." McKinney says he believes the designers have an incentive behind their creations. "A lot of artists' major factor in why they made their cars is a backlash against the corporate messages we see every day," McKinney says. He envisions a world where people take their factory-made cars and put a few personal trophies on them. "Every day is a parade when I drive my car," McKinney says. "If more people decorated their cars, there'd be a lot more smiles on the road." Caption: Stacia Spragg/Tribune Color A skull and crossbones and other antlers adorn the tower of Rick McKinney's art car, Duke. Made of reassembled footlockers,the tower also serves as a sleeping compartment on McKinney's cross-country trips. Color A mutated creature proudly displays the Granada emblem on Duke,a 1976 Granada that has become a work of art 10 years in the making. Stacia Spragg/Tribune Color Rick McKinney of Albuquerque shows off the front of Duke, a 1976 Ford Granada that has been transformed into a roving art car, complete with antlers, doll parts anda typewriter. McKinney's masterpiece has traveled around the country and participated in parades and art car conventions. Copyright, 2001, The Albuquerque Tribune Record Number: 0100000817: