With only orange cones and bollards, a high-visibility vest and a Ford F-350, a Montrealer could saw concrete and play jackhammer on the sidewalk of Fairmount Avenue for an hour without arousing suspicion for putting up a plaque.
We’re so used to working in Montreal that nothing is less suspicious than a construction site where the machines are making a deafening noise. Far from arousing suspicion, this obviously illegal construction site is the creation of activist Marc-Boris St-Maurice.
“A few days before, I came to put up no-parking signs and cones on the sidewalk to indicate work was being done,” he explains to me. “I also asked a friend to come along in construction clothes and watch me figure out how to add realism to my website. »
Louis Philippe Messier
From 12:30 to 1:15 p.m. last Wednesday, November 1st, Mr. St-Maurice, the former bassist of the punk group Grimskunk who became known as the founding president of Bloc Pot, made a racket to place on it a bronze plaque with the Sign “In Memory of the Murdered Sex Workers” outside the Fairmount Bagel store.
- Listen to the interview with Marc-Boris St-Maurice, the activist behind this fake construction site, above QUB radio :
His deception was aimed not only at making fun of the excessive number of construction sites that vex the metropolis, but also at commemorating the date of November 5, 2021, when a young 25-year-old prostitute (whose family asks journalists to keep their identities secret). ) was murdered with a machete, presumably by Fairmount Bagel heir Daniel Shlafman, whose body was found in the same apartment near the store.
According to the coroner’s report, the murderer committed suicide after his crime.
Louis Philippe Messier
In short, Mr. St-Maurice warned me a few weeks before his attack, which he has been preparing since last spring.
He told me that not only did he pay more than $1,000 for the panel, but he also had to learn how to use the grinder and jackhammer.
I watched it during its construction and honestly no one was suspicious. The only suspicious thing was the presence of a man who took too many photos (me).
After mounting the plaque in its concrete niche on a layer of industrial glue, Mr. St-Maurice spent a few days attaching a small wooden board to it and two bollards that didn’t fit well. Certainly not arousing suspicion.
Louis Philippe Messier