TESTAMENT by Józef Robakowski

TESTAMENT

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The static shot from a bird’s-eye perspective shows the artist lying on a red and pink carpet with deer antlers attached to his head. Holding a burning cigarette in his mouth and exhaling smoke, the performer delivers a longer, unintelligible monologue; the words are gibberish, as if he were speaking with his mouth full. Robakowski commented on his self-epitaph: “Today, after almost thirty years, another epitaph appears, this time of ‘Mr Deer’, to personify the desire for arrogant gestures. It is meant to decry the miserable fate of the contemporary artist as a naïve fool, a bootlicker and creator of beautiful ideas and things…”. Robakowski’s ironic commentary refers to himself; by drawing on the stereotypical associations associated with deer (in Polish: jeleń, which means ‘loser’), he creates an image of a naïve man, feeding on ideas, but at the same time endowed with a creative drive, a force that compels him to make “arrogant gestures”.

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avant-garde cinema
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