Elmgreen & Dragset. Prada Marfa

Catégorie: art, installation - 2 Commentaires
28 April 2011

all images from the book “Michael Elmgreen & Ingar Dragset: Prada Marfa”
published by Walther König, Koln (July 1, 2007)
ISBN: 978-3865601957

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You know how I love to hunt after good books. Yesterday was no exception. I found the book which documents the construction of the adobe structure, the installation of the shoes and bags, the surrounding landscape and the opening party of the PRADA “Store” by Berlin artists MICHAEL ELMGREEN and INGAR DRAGSET in 2005.

In line with their other installations, where they recreate and displace common signifiers causing surreal experiences for viewers, this project intented to be a hyper-realistic sculpture of a luxury store. The PRADA “Store” has a sealed door, never open to commerce and it displays as selection of coveted objects.

In the middle of the West Texas desert, on a country road leading to the small town
of Marfa, completely isolated from its usual urban context, ELMGREEN and DRAGSET‘s
symbol of luxury and capitalist promise still sits in that romantic landscape, jarringly
juxtaposed with Marfa’s hard-working native inhabitants, albeit with graffiti now
scrawled on the exterior walls.

It was intended that the structure never be repaired, allowing it to slowly degrade
back into the natural landscape. The plan went awry when three days after the sculpture
was completed, vandals graffitied the exterior, and broke into the building stealing
handbags and shoes. The sculpture was repaired, repainted, and restocked. Now the
PRADA Marfa “Store” has become something of a tourist attraction in its own right.

Window shopping is all you can do at the PRADA “store” in West Texas. But a cowboy can dream, can’t he?



2 commentaires pour “Elmgreen & Dragset. Prada Marfa”

  1. Elmgreen & Dragset: «The PRADA Store» « meerschweinchenreport, le 1 May, 2011 à 16:10 Said:

    […] We Find Wildness presents Elmgreen & Dragset’s amazing «The PRADA Store» (2005). Both bright minded and provided with a huge sense of critical humour, the two Scandinavians are the heroes of a new intellectual art scene that is designed to be embedded in a global society where horses still run free, men still think they can do what others only dream about; and a special mixture of George Orwell’s and Aldous Huxley’s thoughts are about to conquer the world – slowly but surely. TV-channels and parliaments from all over the world have already been taken by stupidity and complete unawareness. […]

  2. Prada Marfa: A Divisive Art Project in the Texas Desert, le 10 October, 2014 à 10:05 Said:

    […] Photo Source :Walther König […]