Street Art: Monkeys Repairing Bicycle

People seem to like the street art thing, so I’m going to keep doing it. Here are monkeys repairing a bicycle. Or possibly apes repairing a bicycle. I’m not up on my primate physiology.

Not sure what I like so much about this, apart from the obvious features of it being both beautiful and weird. I think I like the somewhat discordant blending of two common elements of San Francisco green/eco culture: the bucolic, woodsy, “back to nature” theme, and the bicycles. Also, it occurs to me that having prehensile feet would be a useful trait in the field of bicycle repair.

This piece is a detail from a large mural on Florida Street. If anyone knows who the artist is, please let me know, so I can credit them properly.

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Street Art: Monkeys Repairing Bicycle
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8 thoughts on “Street Art: Monkeys Repairing Bicycle

  1. 2

    Actually, there are old world monkeys without a tail (including some macaque species). All apes are indeed tailless, though, so these would definitely be monkeys. Specifically, new world monkeys, since their tails are prehensile.

  2. 4

    The tail on one resembles that of a New World Monkey-but the foot and eyes on others look human. These must be homo sapiens platyrrhini.

  3. 5

    Monkey would be correct either way. Apes are a type of monkey.

    Nope. The common ancestor of both apes and monkeys millions of years ago was neither ape nor monkey, and the line that eventually produced apes is distinct from that which eventually produced monkeys.

  4. Erp
    6

    Actually I think there are two different groups that are called monkeys (New World and Old World). If you want a group that includes both New World and Old World monkeys then the apes get thrown into that group also (apes and old world monkeys are more closely related to each other than either are to new world monkeys). It is a bit like fish. We humans are more closely related to coho salmon than either species is related to sharks.

  5. 7

    Looks* like monkeys to me, but what do I know? I fix bicycles for a living.

    Prehensile feet wouldn’t be much use to me. The environment where one wrenches is not usually the sort where one would want to walk around without shoes. There can be toxic/caustic liquids spilled as well as bits of metal and wire and what-have-you on the floor that would be unpleasant to tread on. All stuff that should be cleaned up immediately of course, but in reality that tends to wait ’til the end of the day.

    Also, any situation where you need a third hand is usually one where the unsteadiness of balancing on one limb is going to offset the extra appendage’s advantage.

    Now if one of you mad scientists lovely, intelligent biology types could whip up a prehensile tail for me I’d be all over that. Thanks.

    *Bike looks like a fixed gear with bullhorn bars who’s abrupt up turn imply purchase rather than flop n’ chop. This most likely places it as a more recent descendent of the fixie line perhaps of the SF Hipster variety and rules out the ubiquitous so-called Ghetto Fixies. The lack of brake could indicate it’s from a Messenger related species but this is not definite because of the close common ancestors between the two.

    All that aside it’s clear that these monkey/apes are in fact hospice workers. With the incredibly deformed geometry of that individual it could not possibly thrive in its natural habitat. They seem to be making it as comfortable as possible before the inevitable demise of such a grossly mutated specimen. I do hope they preserve the carcass for future study though, much can be learned from these sports.

  6. 8

    Thanks for the info FossilFishy. A lot of people could benefit froma prehensile tail. Pretty much everyone that works with a computer for instance. You coulduse mouse and keyboard at the same time.

    Sensemaker

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