Artist of the day: Artist of the Day, July 18, 2024: Roadsworth (Peter Gibson) a Québec street artist (#2079)

Thursday, July 18, 2024

Artist of the Day, July 18, 2024: Roadsworth (Peter Gibson) a Québec street artist (#2079)

Since 2001, Montreal artist Roadsworth (Peter Gibson) continues to make his mark on the streets of Montreal by introducing elements of wildlife and humor onto an asphalt canvas. In the fall of 2004, Roadsworth was arrested for his nocturnal activities and charged with 53 counts of public mischief, after which he received considerable public support and was let go with a slap on the wrist. Since then the artist has created artwork for municipalities, exhibitions, and arts festivals around the world

In 2008, Alan Kohl made a film on his work, Roadsworth : Crossing the line, a production of the National Film Board of Canada

Roadswork Crossing the Line:
Over a period of three years, the stencil artist Peter Gibson, aka Roadsworth, made his mark on Montreal in the early hours of the morning by launching a self-described "attack on the streets." Armed with spray paint and handmade stencils, he began to play with the language of the streets, overlaying city asphalt markings with his own images: a crosswalk became a giant boot print, vines choked up traffic dividers, and electrical plugs filled parking spots. Each piece begged the question, Who owns public space? Roadsworth: Crossing the Line details the artist's prosecution at home and his travels abroad to France, London and Amsterdam, as he imprints himself legitimately (and illegitimately) on foreign streets. The film reflects Roadsworth's personal struggle to defend his work, define himself as an artist and address difficult questions about art and freedom of expression. With Roadsworth: Crossing the Line, filmmaker Alan Kohl provides a portrait of an artist who provokes debate about the significance of art in urban spaces.

With a name like Roadsworth, you could easily guess that this isn’t any ordinary street artist. Though born Peter Gibson, he chose the name Roadsworth because, as he states, “Where Wordsworth is a poet of words, Roadsworth is a poet of roads.”

Though he started painting on the streets as a form of activism (for more bike paths), his motivation later evolved into a more personal one. It became his alternative form of expression, a creative outlet if you will. Currently his works all have an aspect of protest in them, a way for Roadsworth to comment on today’s social issues or, as he says, “simply protest against the mundaneness of the urban landscape.”

“As my personal artistic process evolved, political concerns were eclipsed by artistic ones and I often felt more inspired by the process than I did by the message I was trying to convey. Marshall Mcluhan's famous quote ‘the medium is the message’ is significant in this regard. The ubiquitousness of the asphalt road and the utilitarian sterility of the ‘language’ of road markings provided fertile ground for a form of subversion that I found irresistible. I was provoked by a desire to jolt the driver from his impassive and linear gaze and give the more slow-moving pedestrian pause for reflection. The humourlessness of the language of the road not to mention what I consider an absurd reverence for the road and ‘car culture’ in general made for an easy form of satire.”

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