Contemporary Art and Automobile Algae

On September 13, the "where to go today" section of a large Helsinki newspaper offered two different ways of approaching the soon to be opened Museum of Contemporary Art. Helsinki City Museum had compiled a walking tour presenting architecture from the Age of Independence, with Chiasma as the grande finale. The tour was a celebration of the Day of European Building Heritage. And then there was the Automobile and Touring Club celebrating the Day of the Automobile with the whole family: "The Century of the Automobile" parade honoured the museum — and its equestrian neighbour, Marshal Mannerheim — by marching, or should we say rolling, past.

Both neighbours must have been equally bewildered. Both the statue and the museum had good grounds for their reaction. Does this century belong to the Great Man on his horse or the Automobile? Are these passing metal objects contemporary art? In brief, what should we think about cars?

We are not dealing with an insignificant creature here. The automobile is no doubt one of the dominating types in our (audio)visual world, or worlds — real and simulated alike. The car is a Gesamtkunstwerk touching all our instincts and capable of taking our breath away in more ways than one. History has been made with and within cars.

Let us pass the deep structures of history for now, as well as practical aspects of utility and harm, the ease of making journey, the unbearability of pollution. Instead, let us concentrate on art and aesthetics. Let us make a gross oversimplification and ask a blunt question: are cars ugly?

I am aware that we are moving on highly subjective and emotional ground here. This sacred cow is a pet, a member of many a family; a tamagotchi for adults, invented a long time ago. I have to emphasise that I am not referring to any individual, delicate and sensitive car person, as I make my statement: I find cars ugly. Or, to put it more succinctly: I find cars ugly collectively.

I was rudely awakened to the collective ugliness of cars some thirteen months ago while making a film in downtown Helsinki. (I must admit that moving the crew and the equipment around did demand a great number of cars.) The urban street abounds in visual and auditory chaff. And a significant portion of that chaff derives from cars. When we emptied a part of a street of traffic signs and parked cars, even stopped the traffic for a while, we witnessed a miracle: buildings grew roots and became visible, all of the sudden the streets were delightfully spacious.

It is in these very bands of cars lining our streets where the core of their collective ugliness lies, in these ever- growing seaweed rafts of metal that poison our vision. That monotonous metal chain appears so unconspicuously and listlessly inevitable that is difficult to grasp the damage it brings. We could compare the effect it has on architecture to adding images of cars to all paintings, or including a background noise of idling cars to every musical performance.

One rarely finds cars in the scale models of architectural designs, especially to the realistic extreme. How will the Chiasma appear like when completed, framed by a continual parade of automobiles?

But are we only discussing (elementary) aesthetics here? If our streets were lined with chains of bikes, would it be equally irritating? The pollution-aware age does have a certain effect on our thinking, of course. The innocent metal cover must bear the sins of its insides. Of course, we can take this the other way round. Those who do see beauty in cars, behold a lyric of fleeting views, the Canticle of Canticles of speed.

Do rows of cars revolt me at all times and in all places? A mass of cars unfortunately is not often any uglier than the mass of walls raised on the adjacent field. Besides, in old photograps automobile groups often seem charming (and these need not be terribly old, twenty years is enough). They are an integral part of the epoch. As time goes by, the metal memories turn golden.

Still I cannot help the fact that I find car mass repulsive. I simply cannot wait for twenty years in order to finally find them attractive.

What should I do, then? Should I put my trust in engineers (a foldable, pocket-size, pollution-free transporter), or perhaps designers (a car representing absolute beauty), or an entirely novel art form (the architecture of car groups!). Shall we put an end to our personal speed metal performances, when the insights of urban planning finally become integrated with the growing civil wisdom?

There is yet another alternative, the logic of infinite figures: ultimately, the car bands inevitably intermingle, and stick to their own impossibility. Yet (sighs the Pessimist with mournful satisfaction) in such a world we may no longer be here to admire the Museum of Contemporary Art rising above the skeletons of cars — or the ultimate museum of contemporary art opening around it.

Markus Nummi