Hero's Hill, a temporary roadside attraction about awaiting a supposed hero, is in response to the hateful and fanatic signs that flourish along roadsides throughout the United States.

The Hero's Hill artwork is my response to the hateful and fanatic signs that proliferate along US roads, reflecting the desire of a significant number of society to place their destiny in the hands of a messiah, a hero, who will come to improve their lives. To me, these messages reflect the abandonment by a large part of US society to believe in the power of the collective, of joint and united action to improve the lot of the individual, the community, society as a whole. It is as if people were no longer capable of shaping their own destiny and could only hope to place their fate in the hands of a superior individual, who would resolve everything, whether divine or political.

Because of their omnipresence along the road, these authoritarian messages constitute a majority discourse that has the effect of making other words and other narratives invisible. And it is this feeling of powerlessness in the face of these orders, which leave no room for other ways of thinking or even simply reflecting, that led me to create a work that addresses anyone driving along the road in a different way.

My artwork is a humorous response to hateful and fanatic signage, consisting of a pile of road gravel installed on the side of the road on which is written, repetitively and hysterically in white, WE WANT THE NEXT HERO TO ARRIVE ON TIME, covering the entire surface of the rock pile. The message is sarcastic, asking the supposed hero to arrive on time at the risk of being fired. The work is interactive, as the spectator's approach triggers the patriotic music of John Philip Sousa's Stars and Stripes Forever and then cuts off in the middle, reinforcing the absurd nature of the situation. 

The repetitiveness of the block lettering has the angry spontaneity of someone who can’t take it anymore and wants neighbours and random people driving by in cars to know it. 

For me, it's also about engaging the public in a different way. With my Cocoon series, the idea is to engage an entire community, a neighborhood, a town, to reappropriate their memory by building an art installation with them that symbolizes what binds them together. With Hero's Hill, it's more about stimulating the curiosity of passers-by, encouraging drivers to stop and ponder the work before their eyes.

Technical items: 

• Size of the gravel pile is about 17 feet high

• Letters are big enough to be read at 55 miles an hour

• Near the gravel pile an emergency alarm button (pedal)

• Step on it and it plays and then cuts off in the middle of the song 

• At the end of the exhibition the road gravel goes to pave the road