The irony in altering a massive, steel, weapon of warfare into a 10 meter long, brightly colored childish delight of balloons is obvious, as is the other factor in this work- the ephemeral quality of its materials. It is constructed with latex balloons, air, and glue, which over a period of hours and days deflate, shrivel, and shrink into a rainbow puddle on the floor. Designed by German artist Hans Hemmert in 2007, it is simply titled german panther, and is a scale replica of the German Panther tanks used in WWI and WWII. I also found it interesting while researching this piece that inflatable decoys are routinely used as a war tactic and have been since WWII (I have attached a picture of those as well) and perhaps they are just as much of a caricature as Hemmert’s work of art- despite the functionality of their designed purpose. It was difficult to find much about this particular work, but there was a one-line statement provided by the artist. Translated by my friend Anne Petters- she says it means “the preparation of being prepared to stay open for the arrival, or non-arrival, of God.”
I did not chose this for its war/ anti-war message that makes up the subject matter of this work, I just loved the juxtaposition of the materials versus the object matter depicted in this piece. It allows the work to have such an ironic presence- where the expectations of a military tank are not met, and what occurs is a situation safe enough for children to play with and poke at.
Defensive caricature... Thats interesting that the army would use these inflatable tanks as decoys. But even more intreging that this same representation of a tank for protection can be seen as a harmless non threatening object, because its just a bunch of balloons. It is like two thoughts brought together in the same piece. It's ironic
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