Guggenheim Las Vegas banking on bikes

Kimberley McGee

Thursday, Oct. 4, 2001 | 8:32 a.m.

"The Art of the Motorcycle" exhibit comes to Las Vegas after extensive stays at the Guggenheim in New York and its branch in Bilbao, Spain.

When the show opened in 1998 it attracted more than 300,000 people.

It went on to open at the Guggenheim Bilbao in 1999 and now comes to Las Vegas to hopefully do the same business, said Lisa Dennison, deputy curator for the Guggenheim Museum in New York. The motorcycle show was chosen for its popularity, Dennison said, but also for its design.

"We wanted to find an object that embodied the great themes of popular culture and there was the motorcycle just begging to be done," Dennison said.

The show features motorcycles dating from the 1868 steam engine-powered bicycle designed by Michaux Perreaux to the most recent technologically advanced models. Beyond the bikes, and for the first time in the motorcycle art show, are 200 pieces of motorcycle memorabilia including sales brochures, posters and advertisements.

The motorcycle was ideal as art because it touched on an individual's sense of adventure, rebellion and danger. The bikes also physically represent the psychological attitude of society at the time they were designed.

"It really allowed us to look at the 20th century through the lens of a specific object that has been a phenomenon," she said. "It's about art, about culture, about society, about psychology. Because of that it really does get to a wide audience."

The show is not only interesting historically, socially and culturally, it also is aesthetically pleasing, Dennison said. The machine has been a mainstay for more than half a century and draws a wide variety of show-goers, she said.

"You get bikers holding their helmets under their arms at the exhibition -- to children, adults, men, women," Dennison said. "There's something there for everybody."

Don't be fooled by the medium, said John Buchanan, curator for the Portland Art Museum in Oregon. This art show is far from simple.

It represents the motorcycle as not only an emblem of the American 20th century in terms of speed, machinery and power but also as an emblem of design, sculpture, painting and craftsmanship, Buchanan said.

"It will be immensely popular with your audience," he said

That audience includes riders, mechanics and bike shop owners such as Rickey Johnson. Johnson builds and repairs custom motorcycles at Fat City Cycles Inc., 2710 Losee Road in North Las Vegas.

"People like looking at the bikes on the streets," Johnson said. "There's something about a bike that makes people think about being younger, freedom."

Take a closer look at most custom-built bikes and a story begins to unfold. What color of paint that is chosen, the lines of the bike's body and even the sound of each bike engine is an individual expression of the owner, Johnson said.

"There's a sense of freedom and uniqueness in each bike," Johnson said. "It's an extension of (the rider's) personality."

Bikes aren't simply considered transportation for motorcycle enthusiasts, said Steven "Staz" DeStout, CEO and president of Staz's American Motorcycles at 1 South Water Street in Henderson.

They are also mobile pieces of art that draw attention -- for free -- on the street.

"The sexier the lines on that bike the more people will be looking at it," DeStout said. "Motorcycles are aesthetically pleasing."

There may be only 2 two percent of the U.S. population riding motorcycles, DeStout said, but the beauty of the bike is much more far reaching.

"There's a nuance around the motorcycle," DeStout said. "You don't have to be a motorcyclist for it to grab you."