Roadkill crow sculpture at LeBreton Flats latest addition to Ottawa's public art scene – Ottawa Citizen

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Move over giant spider. Here comes dead crow.

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“When the Rubber Meets the Road” by Prince Edward Island sculptor Gerald Beaulieu has appeared along the National Capital Commission’s multi-use pathway on LeBreton Flats near the Pimisi LRT station.

Fashioned from recycled tires, the five-metre long, 360-kilogram crow represents “the harm caused by our commuter culture as well as the crow’s role as a scavenger of urban waste,” according to the NCC.

LeBreton Flats used to be the site of a landfill, making the recycled content especially significant, the NCC said in a tweet Monday announcing the installation.

“It made me stop and wonder what it was. So that’s kind of cool,” said Naomi Szigeti, who was biking to work Wednesday morning. “I wouldn’t want it in my backyard, but it’s making a statement and I guess that’s the point. I like it.

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“Garbage, a dead bird — it’s a statement about the environment,” Szigeti said.

Kate Davis, a biologist by training who was also biking to work, was another who stopped to admire Beaulieu’s sculpture.

“I love it,” Davis said. “It’s fun and exciting. There’s lots of public art here — I love the moose too,” she said, gesturing toward the red moose at Pimisi Station by Indigenous artist Simon Brascoupé.

A printmaker herself, Davis said she’s made art using crows and ravens, too — “black birds in the bleakness of Ottawa’s winter.”

“When the wildflowers come up around it, it will be quite beautiful.”

Reaction on Twitter was less positive.

“Oh no. How much did you pay for that. That’s hideous. It looks like someone tossed their trash out of their car,” wrote one user.

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“And how much money was forked over for a piece of art that looks like the head of something Ozzy Osbourne bit off?” wrote another.

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Mayor Mark Sutcliffe hemmed and hawed when asked his opinion about the sculpture after Wednesday’s council meeting.

“Someone sent me a picture,” he said. “Um… I don’t… I’m not an expert on art, so I won’t comment on that.”

Strong reaction to public art is nothing new, of course. Maman, the towering spider in front of the National Gallery of Canada, has become a symbol of Ottawa, beloved by many but a source of heebie-jeebies for others, primarily arachnophobes.

In the 1970s, the pink curvy Traffic sculpture installed at Confederation Park was dismissively nicknamed “The Intestines” by many Ottawans.

A native of Welland, Ont., Beaulieu graduated from the Ontario College of Art and Design in 1987 and now lives and works in Stratford, P.E.I. He originally created the crows for an installation in Charlottetown.

In 2018, he told the CBC the use of old tires was deliberate for the message he wanted to convey. “Often when I do my works the materials are the metaphors, so the tires are exactly the cause of the catastrophe,” Beaulieu told the network. “They’re also very well suited — being rubber, being black — they work perfectly in making the crows.”

When the Rubber Meets the Road will be in place on LeBreton Flats for 12 months.

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