06 Oct Cadillac Ranch, Texas
I was so excited to visit the incredible art installation Cadillac Ranch, just a few miles west of Amarillo, Texas (not technically on Route 66 but close!). Initially I was taken aback by it’s remote location and the complete lack of commerciality. For some reason I had expected a typical roadside attraction with a parking lot and gift shop, but it is far from that. Picture a wide open field full of mud and scrubby grass fenced off by barbed wire, with nothing else as far as the eye can see – with a bunch of Cadillacs stuck in the ground, all on the same angle. It’s also an art piece in a constant state of flux because most visitors bring cans of spray paint and add their own “artistic” touches to the cars: an ongoing work in progress that is totally unsupervised!
Created in 1974 by Chip Lord, Hudson Marquez and Doug Michels (members of the group Ant Farm), it consists of old Cadillacs of different vintages, half-buried nose-first into the ground at an angle that corresponds to the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt. None of this would have been possible without the patronage of Stanley Marsh III, who has been influential in the Amarillo art scene for years. Again, the open road and adventure of The Mother Road, has allowed thousands of people to experience stunning and radical works of art like Cadillac Ranch amazing visibilty. Bravo to artists of the world! Keep doing what you love and we’ll follow you anywhere!
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