It was an eye-sore before it was an icon. Now one artist's beloved truck has left quite an impression on the K-State campus.

Though not always thought of as a work of art---Elliot Pujol's truck has been a mainstay on the KSU campus for years.

"Students would put fake tickets on it telling me it was ugly and had to be removed by sundown." Pujol laughs. But surprisingly,in all those years, no real tickets stuck to the windshield. "No, no real tickets."

Pujol, a professor of jewelry and silversmithing at K-State, used the truck as his automobile at first. He only put copper on it when it wouldn't pass the state inspection because of rust.

"So I popped some metal on it and it passed inspection so when I moved to Kansas, I started applying copper," Pujol admits. "Every year, every summer, I would do a door or something. Then I put a sunroof in, that's a dryer door i got at a salvage yard."

Now Pujol says it has the best parking spot on campus at the Beach Museum of Art, on display there until August. Along with other metal works by Pujol, including a beautiful copper bowl.

"Copper has been my baby so I guess you could call me a coppersmith."
And Pujol has plans for his truck after it has its run at the beach as a part of the Kansas landscape it's graced.

"I would like to see it somewhere along I-70. My vision of it being finished is to dig out the dirt, put a tree in the middle of it and sunflowers growing out of it. The truck has been so important to the development of Kansas. Hauling wheat, cattle, it's an homage to the truck."

Again, you can find that truck at the beach museum of art at kansas state university through august.