Shark-chicken and the good and bad of alley fence art: Kenny Be's Yard Arteology

Privacy fencing provides yard artists a secure area in which to create and display yard art projects that might not otherwise be ready for a full front-yard showing. As the photograph above demonstrates, alley fencing is an especially good canvas for experimenting with art styles and subjects that might be considered a bit too fishy by the neighbors... The art in the photograph above perfectly illustrates how alley fence art separates the good from the bad. In this backyard, an area typically used for playgrounds and clutter, the yard artist has pushed the limits of available materials and skill level to create a yard-art assemblage that is so bad that it has to be good.

The choice of colors and found objects suggests that the sculpture hanging from the tree is a rare species of shark-chicken. The modeling of the mammals on the fence mural indicates these creatures are obese humpback whales, or foil-wrapped burritos with fins.

Below, the tangled webs of back alley fence art... Hundreds of feet of beaded neck chain are used to decorate the alley fence picture above. The rusting chains seem to indicate that this may be an ongoing project that has been added to over the course of many seasons -- a fence art confession of lost time and entanglements. Below, colored balls are used to get the party started... The decorative balls that are used to festoon the alley fence pictured above are the sign of a gracious host. While the privacy fence creates a barrier of separation, the orbital ornamentation successfully brighten the lives of both invited and uninvited guests. Below, a sensitive fence makes room for a rock pile and a tree... Trees often grow around chain-link fences. The tree in the photograph above looks like it has grown around a wooden alley fence. However, similar fence cuts around the hand-made stone barbecue suggest that this fence was sensitively built around preexisting features.

More from our Kenny Be/Comics archive: "Designer fences create beautiful personal boundaries: Kenny Be's Yard Arteology."