Sure, we fair-weather cyclists haul out our shiny, responsibly-maintained road bikes in spring. We might even think we’re putting one over on those auto-bound fools as we zip past gridlocked rush-hour traffic on Friday afternoon, or roll down sun-dappled streets to pick up a few things from the corner store. Those suckers in their cars don’t know what they’re missing, we might think: the wind in our ears and the sun on our faces.

But a few months later, as we slog through the wind, cold and snow of an Alberta winter, the thought of ensconcing ourselves in a cozy little womb of upholstery and steel, sipping our morning coffee and listening to the weather guy describing the -40 temperatures outside, sounds not merely tempting–it seems downright unthinkable to do otherwise.

But not for 29-year-old artist/cyclist/semi-nomad Michael Flaherty, who not only bikes everywhere, in any weather, but actually enjoys being the odd cyclist out on a road full of cars and trucks–his very presence on the streets a coyly raised middle finger to the hegemony of the gas-guzzler.

"You’re intervening in the habits that drivers have," he says. "It has these performative qualities and intervention qualities, because these people have no choice but to confront the fact that they’re burning gasoline to get where they have to go, and you’re not."

Hence the Bicycle Rehabilitation Project, Flaherty’s multi-city installation art show. The concept is simple: Flaherty is traversing North America, stopping in art galleries along the way, where he’ll set up his portable bike repair shop, and tune up bicycles for free.

"A lot of people had no idea this was an art piece until I explained it to them," he says, "and to a lot of people, it wasn’t even really important that it was an art piece. It was important that it was just an action."

The art is important to Flaherty, of course. On his website he writes about his inspirations, including writer Nicolas Bourriaud and photographer/filmmaker Alfredo Jaar. Both artists embody an ideal Flaherty (borrowing a phrase invented by Cuban artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres) refers to as the cultural worker, an artist who also plays the role of an activist and philosopher.

Of course, as political art, Bicycle Rehabilitation Project isn’t subtle–but subtlety doesn’t seem to be what Flaherty is going for. On his website, www.bicyclerehabilitationproject.com, he writes of the "intolerable option of burning gasoline just to get to the grocery store"–fightin’ words in oil country.

"I moved to Ontario a few years ago to do an apprenticeship with a potter," Flaherty says. "I had already decided that I didn’t want to drive anymore, so since he was 10 kilometres outside of town, I had to have a bike... I just sort of found an old one and fixed it up and got it running. I’ve bicycled probably almost every day for five years now."

So far, Flaherty has set up the Project for week-long runs in Seattle and Victoria. He’ll finish in St. John’s in October.

"Seattle was kind of a bust," he says. "It was Memorial Day weekend, and downtown was pretty much empty while I was there... but in Victoria it was excellent. It just happened to be bike to work week there. And I read somewhere that in Victoria, almost seven per cent of the workforce commutes by bicycle anyway, which is by far the most in Canada. [Note: The only official statistic we could find indicates the number is actually around five per cent. –Ed.] So people were just biking by the gallery, and we’d talk about life, bikes, art.... It’s not just an art project for me; it’s my life. I’ll always be a cyclist. I don’t know what I’m doing in the fall. I don’t even have a real home right now, so maybe I’ll just get on my bicycle and pedal somewhere else."