The starting point of Donkey ears project is in a scene of Luigi Comencini’s Pinocchio (1971), when Pinocchio and his friend miss a day of school after following some gypsies who seduce them to a fairground, a “paradise for kids” with roundabouts, candies and drinks all night…They then wake up with donkey ears. Pinocchio first sees his friend’s donkey ears, and they both look at each other without noticing their own ears. All the other kids are doing the same, pointing at each other and laughing. Then, Pinocchio sees himself in a puddle, and realises the transformation…
This film, particularly this scene, which shows his transformation into a donkey, was very striking to me when I was a child. I remember this film very clearly, because at the time I felt that this was quite a grown-up film for children…It was scary and appealing at the same time.
By recreating and reinterpreting the donkey ears, I was interested in recontextualising the transformation as an animal. I wanted to play between the comic and the theatrical, to convey a sense of ‘mental torture’.
Through the process of making the hats, I started using screws and different shapes and pieces of metal, which make the ears look ‘dangerous’ (a bit like torture instruments from the middle ages…). The use of the fur ads to the bizarreness and uneasiness of the object, and when I added them to the metal structure, I realized that they seemed a bit like fetish toys. This idea makes the work a bit disturbing to approach.
When worn, these hats become much more theatrical and humorous, and I really like their surrealistic aspect; as they are a bit absurd and ridiculous. They are meant to be worn by people during the exhibition, creating a kind of ‘donkeys community’ wandering in the show and sometimes passing each other, sometimes being alone. I also like the idea of being a donkey in the art world (like a kid who has to wear a donkey hat in the corner of the classroom because of his misbehaviour)_not very much in a sad and negative way, but more in an ironic and comic way.
I wanted to express a difficulty of communication between contemporary art and viewers. I guess that the one who wears the donkey ears during the show is a bit of an outsider, not very much understanding what is happening but still part of this world, and part of the work. It is also an encounter with other people’s work, either in a interrogative or fascinated way.
Donkey ears are symbol of stubbornness and shame. (In Greek mythology, King Midas had his ears transformed as those of a donkey by Apollo. He then hides his ears and nobody knows the secret apart from his hairdresser, who once betrays him and shouts it to the whole city). Donkey ears are a symbol of shame because they are disproportionate, a bit funny, they are deserve to be hidden. Who wants to be the ass of the story? (but donkeys are also in fact symbols of many contrasting things).
What I feel that I like in this project is the fact that it is open to different interpretations; and this is what makes it interesting to me. I feel that it is a bit complex and problematic, because it is a shifting-meaning object, with a possibility to create different effects, even the most contrasting ones.
I really enjoyed the process of making a theatrical outfit, the mix of materials, the endless possibilities of making something surrealistic and symbolic. In the end, this work has a clumsy look, like very handmade prototypes, but I like its playfulness, its fun, and its open field.
Tags: donkey ear, Pinocchio
