Gumhead - Art project

Canadian novelist and artist Douglas Coupland organised a colorful, albeit sticky, art project in May this year – he invited people to stick chewed up wads of gum on a seven-foot fiberglass statue of his own head.

Located on Howe Street outside Vancouver Art Gallery, the aptly named ‘Gumhead’ statue was a part of Coupland’s ‘everywhere is anywhere and anything is everything’ exhibition. By the time it was taken down on September 1, the statue was covered in gum to the last inch. And it had all melted thanks to the summer heat, resulting in a sweet sticky mess that attracted wasps and bees.

Coupland called it a total success, describing Gumhead as ‘ugly-beautiful’. “At first the added gum looked like jewels against the black,” he said. “And then the Excel chewing gum van parked beside it during the Jazz Festival and took the whole head to the next level. And then we had a heat wave and the gum started to weep. And now it has a 24-hours cloud of bees and wasps around it. It’s a dream.”