A BAFFLING work of art installed at one of Scotland’s most celebrated whisky distilleries is to be scrapped.
The Ford Escort with a lamp post through the bonnet has amazed and confounded visitors to the Glenfiddich distillery for the past eight years.
It has even been suggested jobsworth workmen drilled the 25ft lamp post through the car rather than move the vehicle.
Online, images of the installation have been written off by social media users as Photoshop trickery.
In fact, the skewered Ford was installed eight years ago by celebrated Spanish “spatial sculptor” Luis Bisbe as part of the distillery’s arts programme.
The car park at the distillery in Dufftown, Banffshire, needs resurfacing and bosses at Glenfiddich have reluctantly decided to send the artwork for scrap.
For Glenfiddich’s art programme co-ordinator, Andy Fairgrieve, the decision is particularly hard because the car once belonged to him.
He said: “Unfortunately, the car and lamp post will have to be dismantled so that the car park can be resurfaced.
“There are no definite plans yet when this will happen, but visitors to our distillery will still be able to see the piece if they come this summer – it will be it’s final hurrah.
“Everyone loves the piece and it has been there for eight years, even though at the time we thought it would just be up for the summer.
“The car actually used to belong to me, though it definitely can’t be used any more.
“Over the years it has caused quite a fuss when people notice it, but it usually takes them a while because when you glance at it, it just looks like a car parked next to a lamp post.”
The work, which cost just £300, involved drilling a hole into the staff car park and rolling the car over it.
Certain parts of the engine had to be carefully removed, before lowering the lamp post through the hole and into the ground.
The car bonnet then had to be lifted 25ft into the air and lowered over the top of the lamp post and down onto the car, to complete the illusion.
When local lamp posts are switched on, the car’s headlights are also illuminated while the lamp post above it remains unlit.
The work of art was damaged at Christmas when the inevitable happened and a car skidded on ice and collided with it.
Recent images on social media caused a lively debate .
Marianne McSmith said: “There’s no info about it…I need to know how that pole got there.”
Craigm Jay asked: “Surely it’s a clever fake?”
Alex Stevenson suggested: “It’s been there that long a young lamp post just grew right through it.”
Visitors to the distillery will still be able to enjoy two other clever works by Barcelona-based Bisbe.
He created a bicycle built through a railing and a whisky cask with a broom built through the middle.
