Student’s bike exhibit puts gears in motion

At UCF, it's not uncommon to see students whizzing by on bicycles, but as soon as you leave campus, you're more likely to see a gridlock of cars than a fleet of bicycles.

UCF School of Visual Arts and Design student Greg Leibowitz has an idea to help change that.

Leibowitz took place in a group installation art show entitled "What Moves You?" which opened Thursday at The CityArts Factory in Downtown Orlando. The exhibit contains art from 15 artists and is themed around transportation and its future in Central Florida.
Leibowitz created the Orlando Bike Kitchen Project.

"In the visual setting, I'm taking influences from artists like Buckminster Fuller or Natalie Jeremijenko or Mel Chin, these artists that take this creative way to solve a problem and come up with a solution as an artist," he said.

His section of the gallery space showcased a collection of broken-down bikes and spare bike parts strewn together in a random and intricate assemblage, but there was more to his project than merely the visual.

"I consider myself an activist artist, I'm a student at UCF and I'm a graphic design major," he said. "But I primarily like to do work with nonprofits through education or art, or through community based projects."

The Orlando Bike Kitchen Project is one of those examples of art as a community-based interaction project.

Prior to the show, Leibowitz encouraged Orlando residents to, rather than throwing their bicycles away, donate them at several drop-off locations.

"I sent out a call to action about a month ago looking for bikes and bike parts and volunteers to help out with this project because I wanted to have a nice bunch of bikes and parts and stuff on hand for the opening and then the duration of this show," he said. "So I got about 30 or 40 bikes donated and a bunch of parts, accessories and tools and people that wanted to sign up to volunteer."

Using the donated bikes, Leibowitz hopes to have walk-ins from the street come in and be able to have their bikes fixed or learn a little bit more about  how bikes work.

"We're going to have the tools and the space, the parts laying around if you need a new brake or a new derailer," he said. "We'll take it off one of the old bikes from the trash and put it on a new bike that someone brings in."

He also hopes to have volunteers and interested patrons help to fix up several of the donated bikes so that at the end of the show they can be donated to a charity such as the Parramore Kids Community Center.

"It's interactive," Leibowitz said. "It's for me to put this idea out there for people to respond to it, that's the main objective of the project."

The opportunity to exhibit at The CityArts Factory is also thrilling for Leibowitz and is a central aspect as to why he believes the project will be a successful one.

"I'm excited about this space, this project, because it's right at the corner of Orange and Pine," he said. "It's downtown, it gets a lot of traffic because people can come in and out pretty easily because it's right here, and it's part of this art show where I dont have to worry about selling anything. I don't have to worry about paying the rent, because I'm the artist for this installation show, and it's great because we can just do this project and it doesn't have to generate any income. It's just this creative way for me to come up with this creative project and then come up with this solution."

The show "What Moves You?" runs through Sept. 11.

But for those unable to make the show, don't worry; Leibowitz is currently looking for a permanent space for the Orlando Bike Kitchen Project and hopes to have it up and running again soon.

"Maybe we could get a garage somewhere, or a space somewhere else," he said. "I'm partnered with the Rusted Chain collective. They're already on the ground running with a similar idea, but I'm trying to get them more visibility, more volunteers."

According to its website, Rusted Chain Bike Collective is "a collective effort by local cyclists, activists and other members of the community to open up a space to act as a resource for people to obtain or fix their bikes in a safe, non-discriminatory environment that stresses teaching people how to fix their bikes rather than just fixing bikes for people."