Bearing the brand name Phony rather than Sony, a TV perched upon a Hampden lamppost shows meteorologists are calling for 150 inches of snow.
“It makes people look up and around, and break away from the mentality of ‘I’m in a rush. Hurry, hurry, hurry’ with their blinders on,” Hampden artist Renee Tantillo said about the TV and 39 other winter-themed decorations she and six Hampden artists designed and installed atop lampposts down the Avenue. Sculptor Jim Pollack, known throughout Baltimore for his Hubcap Tree erected every year in front of his home on the 700 block of 34th Street, is among the creative minds who contributed to Operation Lamppost, now in its second year.
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“This collaborative project between the merchants of Hampden and local artists grew out of a desire to contribute to the neighborhood during the holiday season in a creative way,” Susannah Siger, vice president of the Hampden Village Merchants Association.
Operation Lamppost
» When: Through March 21
» Where: The Avenue, Hampden
» Info: Avenue-art.blogspot.com
Siger credits artist coordinator Steve Baker for “getting the artists excited about Operation Lamppost and actually making it happen. We hope this project will spark similar projects that involve community cooperation.”
Baker, who throughout the year creates stained-glass transom windows and experiments with recycled glass, said the 9-foot snowflakes, wreath made of cut nails, flamingo keeping warm with a scarf, clipper ship and other pieces of art atop the lampposts shows how Hampden is “fun and eclectic and open to different ideas.”
Adding something special to Hampden’s main thoroughfare, the installations will be up through March 21, 2009.
For next year’s decorations, Baker has plans to attract a set of well-known artists, but he won’t reveal specifics until summer 2009.
