American artist behind the controversial statue of Melania Trump, America’s first lady This week, bronze swords were drawn in his native Slovenia, Has defended her work as a representative of her husband’s opposition to the presidency.
Brad Downey, A. Conceptualist artist from Kentucky, BerlinThe statue, which replaced the old wooden carvings destroyed in a fire attack in July, was inspired by “disappointment with the policies of my homeland,” he said.
“On the one hand we have people in cages on the US border with Mexico, on the other hand, there is a clear opposition to me, we have a first race, for which English is not his mother tongue. , Whose U.S. Immigrants with extraordinary qualifications were quickly tracked on a visa reserved for immigrants. At the same time, her husband is xenophobic, anti-Islamic.
“I felt I could separate this opposition and make a portrait of it.”
The statue, perched on a poplar tree trunk near Sevnica, Trump’s hometown in southeastern Slovenia, is part of a project launched in Downy several years ago. It ends in a documentary, Melania, Which reverently paints a portrait of artisan Ale “Maxi” Upvek, a professional pipe layer with no academic art school background, sculpting the folk art chain in his spare time.
“I chose Maxi from many local artists because there were similarities between her life and Melania,” Downey said. He was born in the same month and year and in the same hospital. Like him – his father was a mechanic and he grew up in a large family – he comes from a working class family.
“I took a position that I was not controlling the aesthetics of the project. I will keep an ideological distance, and will not order anything. I gave her just one photo to work on, the moment she became the first. “
Downey bought the tree and cut it in the right proportions as well as the plot of land on which the statue stands which gave him the right to erect it.
He paid Maxi to prepare the work, carved from a flatterer tree. It represents a wave Melania Trump Dresses of blue oo ni
For a year there was little or no attention in the field, until Downey arranged an unofficial unveiling, after which it was picked up by the world’s media, which ridiculed it. Drawing comparisons of everything from a smile to a scary one.
“I didn’t remember it as a meme, although I don’t think I was really surprised that it was so friendly,” Downey insisted. The locals he was in contact with praised the monument. “They came on screen and we ate cake – with local melanza tort cream and nuts, and drank. My parents and wife flew. People said they liked it, “he said.
But he received hate mail, “from both left and right”, which, along with media reactions, said he would join his ongoing “Melania” documentary series.
On the one hand, people were criticizing me and asking: ‘Why have you made a memorial of this woman? On the other hand, people were saying, “She looks much better than him.”
Following the tradition of the Preaching Memorial Protocol, with a special focus on Cold War-era buses and statues that specifically defame communist leaders. Slovenia, Donne had already made a silicon plaster of a wooden statue last year, the concept of which was to make a bronze version of it.
“After the October Revolution, when Lenin occupied Russia, he ordered the installation of thousands of wooden linins from Kyrgyzstan to Ukraine,” Downey said. “Over time, they gradually became more permanent bronze. This trend later spread to China. ”
When a wooden melania pot was set ablaze in a fire attack on July 4 this year – some locals, Downey says, “suspect CIA involvement”, although police have yet to identify the culprits. Couldn’t find it – he quickly removed the burnt and scratched marks, which he later found Went to exhibit in an art exhibition.
The bronze copy was made during the Covid-19 lockdown, which forced him to stay in Slovenia, and was inaugurated on Wednesday by Maxi, who took it with him in the presence of about 20 locals bringing home-made liquor.
Selvinica, a spokeswoman for the municipal corporation of Melania Trump’s birthplace, Rejected his idolRose tells the Slovenian, Danvik: “It does not match our values of cultivating a sense of respect for our fellow human beings.”
Downey’s performance in Slovenia coincides with the recent Black Lives Matter protests against the statues’ pp, from which the United States is moving.
“While I agree with the BLM views, although it is not necessary to pull out the monuments, I thought in this case, it has a bad effect – a monument that is important to the monument, the concept of power and what it is. Support. ”
