Marko Mäetamm
Shell-portrait
| Artist: | Marko Mäetamm (1965 - ) |
| Title: | Shell-portrait |
| Date: | 1994 |
| Technique: Material: |
lithography paper |
| Height (cm): | 57.2 |
| Width (cm): | 43.0 |
| Dimensions: | sheet size |
| Description: | “I also remember an image from the distant past. I was riding a tricycle (I guess I was very young at the time) around a house in that small village. On the ground floor there was a clothing store with a painted picture in the window. There were a pair of pants, a shirt and, if I'm not mistaken, a shoe. The picture was made with even, pastel colours in a clear and ascetic fashion. The images were surrounded by a delicate black or dark gray line. I looked at the window for a long time and the aesthetic experience was imprinted in my memory forever. To me - a child - it had nothing to do with an advertisement, information about the clothes being sold inside, nor with art. It was just something completely alluring that I can't explain rationally. Perhaps since then I have been attracted to different sign systems…" Mäetamm has defined his works and all contemporary art as a traffic sign: mobile, clear-cut, emotionless, bright and with easy-to-read information. Despite the random objects (Cassette) and situations (“Colourful Friends"; “Three in a Flower Garden") and their accentuated meaninglessness in his work, Mäetamm's joyful sympathizing with the objects does not allow us to take them as neutral. The clumsy penguin-like characters in his image inevitably make us grin. The image of Jesus Christ on a cross wearing a suit introduces the artist's grand series, created some years after, that ponder over the nature of God, the Devil and the act of Creation (“Chemistry of Being" 1999; “Me Supernatural", 2000), and shape the themes and questions into similar traffic signs and schemes. The “Shell Portrait" does not have a face - it has been replaced by a logo of the gas station in the background of the picture. “In addition there's a work in progress: I'm planning to write a song titled “Shell Religion". It is based on car models and petrol companies. In this song, Shell is Jesus, who sacrifices himself and creates the Shell World." Anu Allas |
| Related categories: | Contemporary Art |
| Copyright notice: | Art Museum of Estonia |
| AME collection: | Prints and drawings collection |
| Collection number: | G 27380 |
| Accretion number: | EKM j 44812 |
| Muis reference | http://muis.ee/museaalView/1501468 |
| File info: |
Source type: slide 6x6/7/9 File type: TIF File size: 40.67MB Resolution: 3606*3916px @ 1900dpi |
