Ittepåsenteret (Rogaland kunstsenter)
16.9.-24.10.10
Entering the exhibition you enter a world of bizarre, funny, horrible and grotesque architecture. The walls are filled with pictures, text and video portraying the strangest buildings or worlds ever created. They all have in common that people are inhabiting them. Whether you are interested in the exotic of different cultures, architecture or the bizarre, you will enjoy this exhibition.
But this exhibition is not only about buildings, it is more about the people behind and inside the buildings and constructions. First of all this shows the background of how the buildings were made. Some are a creation of a dictatorship, like the giant head of dictator Marcos of the Phillippines, the giant busts of Saddam Hussain, and the 4km long building of holiday apartments commissioned by Hitler. Some buildings are created by mad minds, like the Winchester house that never got finished and the Collyer brothers' home filled with collectables and garbage. Somehow the story of the woman married to the Berlin Wall fits into this category too. Even if this is not a construction you can live inside, she definitely lives close to it. Some buildings are inhabited by pure necessity, like the Grand Northern Cemetery of Manila, the Walled City of Hong Kong, the warship/oilrig shaped Japanese island, or the garbage town of Cairo. Some are made to attract attention, like a giant hollow whale, elephant and troll. And some constructions are just so outworldish they must have been made by aliens, like the giant domes of Siberia.
The exhibition also show the people of these worlds. They are living in these neverlands, these inhabitable buildings. How is it possible to live all your life inside the head of Marcos, inside a tomb, in a garbage dump, inside an elephant or a whale carcass, and accept this as normality? Most of all the Manila cemetery pictures show this contrast of normality/absurdity, where people live for generations on their ancestors' tombs, attending school, eating at cafes, washing their clothes.
The contrast is especially apparent here in Norway, where your home is a crucial part of your image. Your home shows who you are, and conformity with a marginal twist of individuality is the target. You may have a funny mailbox or doormat, but if you start painting the walls in a strange colour or build towers you set yourself aside of the society. Still we can even here find some examples of weird architecture, like the Swedish troll in Årjäng where the mayor adresses the public, or a local example, the giant Gulliver of Kongeparken fun park with a playground inside.
Neverlands Revisited celebrates the non-conformity, the madness, the lack of fear of being different
Link to the exhibition info page here
Link to the exhibition info page here
