Another Roadside Attraction

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A little girl, about six years old, skips around Clem T. GoFur in the Lake Country Art Gallery in B.C.’s Okanagan Valley. “Wow, he’s BIG,” she says, “and those boots!” Those boots, indeed, but look up! Clem, mascot at the World Famous Gopher Hole Museum in Torrington, Alta., is all shiny, cartoon new; the ceiling tile has been removed to accommodate his hat.

Clem’s saucy, recumbent pose dictates the path of movement into Scott August’s exhibition, Furbish: Remnant Themes of Post-Amusement, on view until Aug. 27. I swerve past the boots and follow a wall of photos: here is the iconic peach hut in Penticton, the whale waterslide from Old MacDonald’s Farm in West Kelowna, and a newspaper clipping about Peter Soehn, creator of curvy statuary and the subject of August’s installation. The bottom of each photo curls away from the wall, evoking fragility, a temporary existence. Childhood memories.

Nostalgia in bloom, next is the full-wall image of a decrepit billboard advertising Old MacDonald’s Farm, and here’s where it gets all lovely and tricky. To view the 17-foot-long collage, one is backed against the raw, two-by-four frame supporting Clem. It’s a disconcerting peek behind the magic, rubbing shoulders with the pretense of it, all while enjoying the beauty of it too.

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West Kelowna billboard showing remnants of advertisement for popular theme park. Photo courtesy Scott August.

West Kelowna billboard showing remnants of advertisement for popular theme park. Photo courtesy Scott August.

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Patrick Soehn stands in his father's workshop in the early 1990s in Kelowna, B.C., next to his look-alike, Clem T. GoFur before installation in Torrington, Alta.

Patrick Soehn stands in his father's workshop in the early 1990s in Kelowna, B.C., next to his look-alike, Clem T. GoFur before installation in Torrington, Alta.

Detail from Soehn Family Photos (1950s-1990s), documented by Scott August, 2015, from Peter Soehn's studio, courtesy of his family (from “Furbish: Remnant Themes of Post-Amusement,” 2017)

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The Peach in Penticton, B.C. Late 1980s or early 1990s. Detail from Soehn Family Photos (1950s-1990s), documented by Scott August, 2015

The Peach in Penticton, B.C. Late 1980s or early 1990s. Detail from Soehn Family Photos (1950s-1990s), documented by Scott August, 2015

from Peter Soehn's studio, courtesy of his family (from “Furbish: Remnant Themes of Post-Amusement,” 2017)

“I've been influenced by Peter Soehn’s creations since my childhood,” says August. “Although it's only in recent years I learned his name and pieced together that he built all my favourite artworks and amusements.” Soehn, the Okanagan’s largely unknown creator of roadside attractions, died in 2015. He has a kindred spirit in August, himself a builder of oversized installations. August has painstakingly collected bits of Soehn’s work, even foraging pieces of the Old MacDonald Farm billboard – chunks are mounted on the wall like an unfinished jigsaw puzzle. Old MacDonald and the pig look cheery, in spite of pockmarks and broken edges. Smaller fragments are stacked in the corners, the leftover, melancholic pieces of a life.

To view August’s delightful miniature reproduction of Soehn’s workshop, you peer through the eyes of an illuminated dog’s head. The eyes are just far enough apart that you must peek through one eye at a time, catching only fragmented glimpses into Soehn’s world, an apt metaphor for the task August faces in archiving his work.

The little girl, satisfied by Clem’s outlandish size, is off to find other fantastical wonders. Soon, Clem will move outside the gallery, where the elements will wear down his shine and where kids will thrill at the sight of him as they whiz by, faces pressed against car windows. Here’s to you, Peter Soehn.

Lake Country Art Gallery

10356A Bottom Wood Lake Road, Lake Country, British Columbia V4V 1T9

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