California Man Fights Municipal Powers That Be by Immortalizing His Boat on a Fence
After a California city notified a resident that his fishing boat might be an eyesore, he said “I’ll show you an eyesore,” using the city’s own rules (and flawless trompe-l’oeil technique) to just barely comply. We stan a petty king.
By Katie Compa · May 15, 2024
Seaside, California, a small city near Monterey on the state’s Central Coast, might sound like an idyllic place where no one ever disagrees—but as it turns out, the city government recently tried (and failed) to bogart a local resident’s buzz. Etienne Constable, a 30-year resident of Seaside and an avid angler, was told his fishing boat was in violation of the municipal code.
He’d been storing his boat and trailer in the driveway for four years, and as far as we can find, his neighbors never complained—yet here he was with an official city letter, under threat of a $100 fine and a citation, to remove or hide them behind six-foot-high fence. Constable says though he was aware of the code requirements, since he’d never had a complaint, he thought it wouldn’t be an issue in his immediate vicinity.
It turned out that after complaints about the code not being enforced, the city hired someone to send out the letters to residents, to which we say ACAB (yes, people who run HOAs absolutely qualify as cops).
And he was right: other residents had so little of a problem with it that Constable was able to hire his literal next-door neighbor, Hanif Panni, for a light pranking of the town’s authorities: he built the fence himself, and a few months later, Panni—a professional mural artist—painted a photorealistic image of the boat on it (with the real thing sticking up just behind).
The acting city manager saw the painting go viral on social media before he even knew it was in Seaside. Once he found out, rather than escalating the conflict, he loved the solution and actually called Constable to congratulate him on the idea for the mural. Imagine coming up with an ingenious way to stick it to the man, and then the man… thinks it’s hilarious and wants to give you a high-five? Rude. Disappointing. Like getting a high five from the middle school principal. Couldn’t be us!
But Constable and his artist neighbor truly didn’t intend to cause a headache for anyone—they just wanted to make a joyful, artistic point. Panni, who uses the name Hanif Wondir for his work, has already received more than one request for the same treatment on other local fences from neighbors who got the same letter as Constable.
Keeping up with the Joneses? More like keeping up with the Banksys.