There’s a reason why everyone loves bicycles. They’re historic objects that bridge centuries and cultures and they also get us around quickly. They’re a feat of simple engineering even as today’s designs are high-tech and varied. No matter how simple or geared up, bikes have in common basic moving parts. And they’re eyecandy: Some bikes inspire and amaze. Then there are bikes that shed parts as they jerk uncertainly (still going!) down the street.
Graphic designer Jennifer Beatty, a graduate student at the School of Visual Arts in New York, decided to use the shrapnel from once-loved but now broken bikes to create something else people can love: art. The idea emerged when Beatty and her fellow students were tasked with creating a 100 Days project, in which the artist performs one basic operation every day for 100 days–to eventually add up to a larger piece of art. Beatty’s is called 100 Hoopties, “hooptie” being a slang term for a beat-up old bike.
100 Hoopties requires Beatty to recreate famous posters–with old bike parts. She’s more than halfway through the project now, and has recreated everything from the Detroit Red Wings logo to the Saved by the Bell logo to René Magritte The Son of Man painting (a man with a green apple on his face) to an entire Pac-Man maze. Follow the project here.
[via fast co. | design]