Painted Local Signal Boxes for Locals, By Locals
A citizen's forum contribution with a photo essay by a student at UNR who enjoys the variety of locally painted signal boxes:
F"or people who live in Reno, the city can often feel melancholic.
The grey and brown during the winter overshadows any color within the city.
You drive downtown and there's trash and an overall dreary vibe.
For a long time, when I would drive around Reno I never really saw any color. Driving towards Midtown the other day, I came across a signal box of a painting of a girl surrounded by clouds and a blue sky.
This made me realize Reno has something most people drive past without noticing and it quietly changed how I see Reno entirely.
Signal boxes are the utility boxes sitting at intersections commonly used to control traffic lights.
In Reno, and in Sparks as well, many of these boxes have been turned into canvases for local artists.
I didn’t expect signal boxes to change the way I feel about Reno, but in a small way these do.
When driving, you’re stopped at a red light and suddenly there’s a signal box with intricate geometric shapes. You weren’t even looking for it but now you can’t look away.
What made me fall in love with the signal boxes was how each one is completely different. Photographing these signal boxes, I found myself lingering longer than I expected. I wanted to figure out what the artist was thinking, and how the design is connected to Reno's culture and history. This was a new curiosity, something that the city hasn’t given me in a long time.
These boxes are for the people stuck at the light on their way to work, kids walking home from school, and for people waiting at the bus stop. These signal boxes exist to have something to look at other than our sometimes dreary environment.
Other art pieces in Reno don’t give me the same effect. Take the sculpture on 301 West 4th Street. Sure it's nice in its own way but it feels catered to an outside audience.
When I see a signal box I feel the opposite. Not an ad, not a bold sculpture, but art made for locals by locals."
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