Gepetto refers to my post about Ron Mueck, a few months ago.
As for Frankenstein, it refers to Michael Landy, whose exhibition at the National Gallery, Saints Alive, I went to see yesterday. Landy took inspiration from traditional paintings of saints from the early Renaissance in the Gallery to assemble his “characters” (as the collages in the first room show), like Dr Frankenstein assembled his creature: a leg of one, an arm of another. But there is much more to them.
I felt as if a religion neophyte had created these pieces, discovering the saints’ attributes that the faithful know so well and the absurdity and the suffering linked to martyrdom for the first time. They are alsmost childish in a way. The sculptures look like Victorian automata but so big, they are literaly awesome.
The pieces are so naive and so violent all the same. I think it is this violence, that shocked me most (and scared my little one who wouldn’t enter the room because of the noise!). The abrupt ear-drum-breaking repetitive movements that destroy the pieces (one was out of order!), as martyrdom destroyed the saints, are comical and disturbing at the same time. The viewer has to press a pedal or turn a wheel to trigger the brutal mechanisms. One can even win a prie in a lucky dip version of saint Francis!
What a shock!