The Canada Truck is a national tribute
This Canada Day, be on the lookout for Halle Halle’s art car salute to the True North. If you’ve seen it around town, you’ll never forget it.
Halle Halle’s red Toyota Tacoma is a mobile tribute to all things Canada.
The Dundas resident has never counted the trophies, figurines, decals, and ornaments glued to her truck, but every visible inch of the large pickup screams Canadiana.
Crammed onto the hood and the perimeter of the roof are hockey players, beavers, totem poles, PEI potatoes, lobsters, the Parliament Building, maple syrup, tents and trailers, donuts and tributes to Canadian inventions, including basketball, Winnie the Pooh, and Superman. A large loon stands out as a hood ornament.
The sides are covered with Halle’s hand-painted work, including a bear, wolf, canoe, snowshoes and a Mountie. The length of the passenger side is cascading maple leaves with the names of famous Canadians.
The tailgate reads: Sorry, eh! Canada.
Her email is there, too (hipchikgal@hotmail.com). She invites Canadians to send stickers or a small souvenir from their hometowns that she can add to her truck, which she simply calls The Canada Truck.
The truck’s dash is covered with Funko Pops (the square-headed, big-eyed collectibles) of Jim Carrey as the Riddler, Mike Myers as Austin Powers, Keanu Reeves, Dan Akyroyd, Rick Moranis, Bob and Doug McKenzie, and Shania Twain.
Wherever Halle goes, the truck attracts a crowd. People leave notes saying seeing it made their day. Her friends joke that she’s easy to track around town.
“It’s fun for me,” says Halle, a retired signal repair technician from CN Rail.
“What artist gets the validation of people loving their art multiple times a day?”
The only negative comments she’s ever heard are from people worried about items flying off but Halle affixes everything with Marine Goop and only chooses items that are lightweight plastic or wood. She says it takes pliers to get anything off.
Her interest in art cars began more than 20 years ago when Halle painted a 1988 Toyota Corolla with leopard spots.
“It was blue and I hated the colour so I decided to paint it myself.”
Her children, then 3 and 5, covered the interior with stickers and used permanent marker to draw on the doors. Halle then painted their drawings in bright colours.
With each new vehicle since then, Halle has chosen a theme, including flowers and bugs, and rhinestone skulls and flames.
This hobby has filled a creative need but also helped Halle overcome shyness because, on the road and in parking lots, she’s always the centre of attention.
“I just really like making people happy or giving them a reason to smile.”
Halle is now active in the art car scene, setting up a Facebook page about 15 years ago that has followers from around the world. The Canada Truck has its own Facebook page, too. She's drivwen all over North America in it.
Two years ago, she travelled to Houston for an art car event that featured a parade of 277 vehicles and more than 300,000 spectators. The Canada Truck took second place in the category for cars that are driven daily.
When she bought the red pickup in 2018, she considered hearts and roses as themes, but soon settled on Canada. She briefly considered changing it all out when the trucker convoy crowd managed to make flying the Canadian flag controversial.
But now, with a groundswell of national pride amid tariffs and 51st state rhetoric, her art car project means even more than ever, says Halle.
“I think it’s important for it to be The Canada Truck right now.”
