Redrum

Rerdum! Redrum! Drawing Marco Casagrande.

We were invited to Anchorage in February 2003 by Alaska Design Forum and decided to drive there by car. We shipped a Land Rover Defender from Helsinki to Halifax Nova Scotia in the Atlantic coast of Canada and drove it to Anchorage across the frozen North America. The Alaska Highway is surrounded by broken trucks, oil tanks and occasional moose. the closer to Alaska you get the more oil related junk there is in the nature.

Inspired by this and the Alaskan oil industry in general we decided to build a temple for oil in the middle of Anchorage. The material is recycled Alaska Railroad oil tanks cut to sections and set standing to frame away the city and open to sky. The floor is out of 7.000 pounds of oyster shells, the origin of oil. The brutal structure is painted bright red inside and has a fireplace in the end.

There was a vote in the local TV: "Is this a piece of fine art of a slap against the face of Alaska?" Fine arts lost. People were complaining that the temple smelled like oil.


Casagrande & Rintala 2003
Alaska Design Form
Anchorage Alaska
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