Kevin Cyr Unveils Awesome Bike Camper at “Home in the Weeds” Exhibition

Kevin Cyr, a Brooklyn-based designer and artist, opened his new mobility and shelter-themed exhibition, 'Home In The Weeds', this last month at <a href="http://www.941geary.com/shows/kevin-cyr">941 Geary in San Francisco.</a> Cyr is the artist who designed and built the fantastic human-powered campers, <a href="http://www.kevincyr.net/index.php?/ongoing/camper-kart/" target="_blank">Camper Kart</a> and <a href="http://inhabitat.com/camper-bike-pedal-powered-rv-for-one/">Camper Bike</a>, as a way to explore human powered movement and shelter with a vintage aesthetic. His new project is a collection of shelters for a <a href="http://inhabitat.com/keg-apartments-reinvision-liquid-container-trucks-as-mobile-houses/">future worst-case scenario</a> and includes a bike-pulled trailer, a tent with wainscoting, a shelter from <a href="http://inhabitat.com/incredible-rooftop-treehouse-in-amsterdam-made-from-fruit-veggie-crates/">discarded materials</a> and a fallout foxhole shelter built into the ground.

Home in the Weeds is Cyr's personal reaction to the fragility of our current society and the feeling of imminent doom.

Natural disasters, job loss, injury or other misfortune have the potential to drastically transform our lives, so Cyr wanted to explore how shelter can provide a peace of mind in these turbulent times.

In this solo exhibition, Cyr built or transformed recycled, reclaimed and vintage materials into safe haven in a future worst-case scenario and he also explores optimistic notions of home, self-preservation, mobility, concealment and protectionism.

The first shelter is a tag-along camper towed by an old Raleigh 3-speed bike, reminiscent of his earlier camper/bike projects.

Next is a transportable, yet immobile canvas tent that conceals a built-out room with wood flooring, wainscoting walls and a wood burning stove.

Thirdly is a rustic shack built from found materials, conceived as an urban fort and equipped with a CB radio for communication with allies, peep holes for scanning the surroundings and weapons for a last resort.

Finally, foxhole, underground shelter, stocked with survival necessities for a worst case scenario, is a site-specific installation that Cyr built into an oil pit used by the former smog shop occupant.

Cyr also created a series of drawings, paintings, silkscreen editions and photographs of the shelters, people who might inhabitat them and objects that are included in the installation.

The drawings of the shelters emphasize the design of each piece, while paintings of the objects speak to the vintage aesthetic.

The supporting material fills in the details of the story behind the shelter and the characters who would live there.

The 'Shanty Chateau' is made from found and discarded material.

A photo with the front removed shows all the secret activity going on inside.

Home In the Weeds is on display at 941 Geary until June 4th, 2011.