Roadside Attractions in New Mexico

2 places

Quirky·Otero County
The Giant Pistachio
A pistachio 30 feet tall stands beside US Highways 54 and 70 north of Alamogordo, New Mexico, its buff shell split to show a purple and green seed. Tim McGinn commissioned it after his father died in 2007, and it was finished the following year. He gave a local craftsman, Ernest Martinez, a single fresh pistachio and asked him to build one the size of a windmill.
Quirky·Doña Ana County
The Recycled Roadrunner
A roadrunner 20 feet tall and 40 feet long, built entirely from rubbish, stands at the Scenic View rest area on Interstate 10 west of Las Cruces, New Mexico. Olin Calk made the first version in 1993 at the city landfill, using nothing that had not been salvaged on the site, to make people look at what they were throwing away. The city's visitor bureau dates it a year earlier and names a second artist, but the city's own catalogue of its public art credits Calk alone.