M the Giant- Ath is a city from Belgium famous for its giant puppets, which have been declared by the UNESCO as Patrimony of Humanity. They invited me to have a solo show in the cultural centre of the city so I proposed to have in the middle of this traditional ritual a new giant but with out a face, inspired in one of the characters of a book by the German architect, Ernst Neufert.

In a way, I tried to place in an intruder in the tradition, which I named M. a short name for monsieur or mister but also a short name for modern, in its most etymological sense.

A big giant wonders around the city out of its traditional context of manifestation at first. Also he walks inside the contemporary art fair of Brussels during its last edition becoming one visitor more.
In a future I intend to incorporate it into the original traditional celebration. This can be seen as a tentative to introduce contemporary art into more traditional costumes and its supported by the fact that the new puppet is built in the same traditional way as the original ones with straw, paper, wood and fabric. The only difference is that the new one has no face, being able this way to adopt any kind of identity.




M. el Gigante

Artist: Emilio Lopez-Menchero
Production year: 2006
Duration: 00:13:58
Catalogued as: EXPERIMENTAL, PERFORMANCE, DOCUMENTATION, CULTURE/IDENTITY

Galleries:
Marta Cervera

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