"Long Time No Sea" by artist Pippa Garner, 1986
1968 Buick LeSabre / 1967 Datsun, and mixed materials
This modified 1968 Buick LeSabre was created by artist Pippa Garner in 1986. Titled "Long Time No Sea" as seen on the transom boards, Garner sometimes referred her creation as “Two If By Sea”. The Audrain owns this art car along with 3 other pedal-driven vehicles created by the artist.
Garner began her training in the 1960s studying at the highly regarded Transportation Design department at Art Center, California with plans to become a car stylist. In the era of Muscle Cars and excess, car design was pushing the limits of size, weight, horsepower, and eye-catching details. Garner's artistic reply pointed out absurdities in automobile design and made fun of social trends.
The artist sketches noted and punned the car as the "Nauti-Mobile". Garner created the flying bridge by grafting the windshield from a 1967 Datsun on top of the then well-used 1968 Buick LeSabre, creating a cockpit through the roof of the car. Making a tongue-in-cheek real land yacht, complete with a real ship's wheel, bow pulpit rail, and varnished trim! Mechanical connecting rods engage the original steering column and control pedals and make the car drivable from the flying bridge.
Garner continues a 50-plus-year career that has constantly pushed back against consumerism and marketing, highlighting absurdity, and creating an incredibly varied body of artistic work and cultural commentary. You unknowingly have likely seen some of Pippa's illustrations and drawings of over 100 back-page drawings, wacky solution after essential widget, illustrations of "inventions" in Road & Driver magazine.
"Pippa was born Philip Garner, fought in the Vietnam war, contracted leukemia through the exposure to Agent Orange, appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, the Merv Griffin Show, and other talk shows showcasing her satirical consumer product "inventions", and her art has appeared in Car and Driver, Rolling Stone, Arts and Architecture and Vogue, among other publications. In 1993 at the age of 50 underwent surgery to become a woman." - excerpted from Pippa Garner's bio and photos, courtesy of Redling Fine Art, Los Angeles CA.
Specifications:
Stock 1968 Buick LeSabre with flying bridge created with the windshield from a 1967 Datsun, and mixed materials.
Engine: GM small block 340.2 cu in V-8, 2-barrel carburetor
Transmission: 3-speed automatic
Power: 230 hp
Torque: 350 ft-lbs, 475 Nm
Length: 217.5 in
Width: 80.0 in
Height: 72.0 in
Wheelbase 123 in
Top Speed: 113mph; 40mph / feels unsafe at higher speed with modified steering and foot controls
Weight: 4500 lbs