Allusions to Power

From tear gas to tears 05.06.2003 Areen, Eero Epner.

The desire for death meets pop culture in the Vaal gallery.
..This is somewhat different from the internationally striking art practice, where turning weapons into works of art often carries pacifist messages and pushes the immediate war experience, thus becoming more of an engaged media event than anything more.
The authors of the exhibition “Allusions to Power” were not interested in excavating the experience of violence from personal memory wells or reflecting a horror story stored in the collective memory – their sources rather feed on that part of pop culture whose only desire is aimless pleasure itself, fun without obligations and functions.

“Allusions to Power” draws in both the observation of power fetishism cooled to the absolute zero point and the transformation of a demonstration of power into an elegantly decadent one. Instead of a proletarian revolution or overthrowing the left-wing power apparatus, work presses the semiotic neutralization button, repeatedly emphasizing any reluctance to “make statements” or “say anything”. The noose around the Author’s neck squeezes charmingly, the desire machine has been created. Placed in the middle of the gallery in a power vacuum, the police car turns into an unstoppable machine producing allusions and desires, or – quoting the classics – “one still desires what is contrary to one’s real interests”. The power that sits in the front seat of a police car with muffled sirens is something that is both feared and passionately loved. In Lõo’s action, fascism as an absolute desire for power becomes a part of pop culture, an offensive act that triggers our desires rather than trying to heal our senses.

The sound patterns that cover the gallery walls and expand the space create a situation, one-off and completed. And this situation says: “When I hear the word ‘desire,’ my hand reaches for the revolver.” The protest art holsters are already empty by then.