Liz Toohey-Wiese, Canadian
Come Back Soon, billboard
2020
Installed on Highway 97, this billboard was made visible to the public to get them to think more
critically about the frequency of wildfires that are happening in Canada. It is made visible when
heading north from Vernon towards Kamloops. Liz Toohey-Wiese first got inspired to do wildfire
related art during the fires during the summers of 2017 and 2018 when wildfire smoke came all
the way down into the city that she was living in. It was then, in 2020, when Toohey-Wiese saw
her first wildfire in person which inspired the billboard shown above. This art is meant to start a
conversation about human-influenced climate change, and it does just that by creating an
almost sinister warning about how commonplace wildfires have become in the region, getting
the onlooker to reflect on how this could affect the future. Label by Riley Kelley