Hammering Man in Human Bondage

All tied up and no place to go. The Hammering Man (Jonathan Borofsky, 1992, #3277164.) was stopped and restrained this last fall as part of the Seattle Art Museum's huge construction process. If you haven't been downtown, the SAM is sporting a fancy, skyscraping new appendage off its Northside: The new WaMu Tower. Fortunately for SAM, this will increase the museum's floorspace. Meanwhile, the iconic, ever-hammering Man was stopped while fences surrounded his feet (and the rest of the building) and the construction pushed on.
He really deserves the rest: "The Hammering Man's arm "hammers" four times per minute from 7 am to 10 pm every day. He rests its arm each evening and every year on Labor Day." One day off a year? 15-hour days? He's a throwback to the American capitalism of the late 1800's, or the Asian capitalism of today. A time we'd be best off only remembering. (Of course with increasing overtime and lousy vacation compensation, Americans may be slowly moving back there anyway.)
At last visit a week ago, he'd actually been disassembled in part -- dis-armed, actually -- with no date posted as to when he'll be back on the line, banging away. Probably soon though, since the skyscraper thing (described as 'flute-like' by The Stranger's art critic Jen Graves) is finished and partially occupied already.

Cookery Fence

It's a memory wall of sorts, which grows yearly with cake tins, copper ornaments and cooking implements extracted from thrift stores. Chaotic yet peaceful, it makes a Sunday walk that much more delightful.

Knitta Mountain

Summit and Pine, this sign received its first bomb-tastic sweater recently. Clearly the work of the notorious clandestine Knitta knetwork, that loose affiliation of underground art terrorists; the local Seattle cell has obviously be onna move recently as rumors of another strike in Ballard are floating about (link to post). Meanwhile, there are perhaps more out there...but to find them we'll need your help. Anyone seeing the work of these dangerous knittorists should report all sightings immediately.

Lawn Rocket

The concrete nosecone of our nuclear ambitions perhaps? Fixed, ready and pointed just above a neighbor's roofline... A weird monument in front of an otherwise normal house, on an otherwise normal street, in a mostly normal neighborhood. It seems out of place, but it's been there a long time. Shortly after I took this photo and wandered away a fellow pulled his truck alongside me and my friend mentioning that he'd seen us taking pictures. "We used to play on that thing back in the early 60's," he said. Back when Boeing was a happy place to work, and our nuclear future looked ever so bright...