Frankie a.k.a. The Creature of Doctor Frankenstein

KLAT (Geneva, 1997)
Collection : Fonds d'art contemporain de la Ville de Genève (FMAC)

KLAT is the name of an artists’ collective founded in 1997, when its members were still students at the École supérieure d'art visuel (school of fine arts) in Geneva. Today it consists of three artists, Jérôme Massard, Florian Saini and Konstantin Sgouridis, who create events, installations, sculptures and films, all of these works insinuating themselves into a social or exhibition space in their own way, to either interfere with its codes or reveal its signs. For the Plaine de Plainpalais, the collective created a sculpture inspired by the novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, whose story was written in Geneva in 1816 by English novelist Mary Shelley. The bronze monument, a tribute to the famous monster cobbled together from human body parts, is intended as a contemporary revival of this character driven to evil by a society that loathes him. Here Frankenstein’s monster embodies the marginal or vagabond figure, he who wanders and differs, and the sculpture is an invitation to benevolently consider otherness. While highlighting the horrifying appearance of Frankenstein’s monster, with his hunched back, deformed face, bony feet and stitched-up hands, the artists also gave him modest height and contemporary clothing to emphasize his deeply human aspect. This metaphorical figure offers the symbol of a creature rejected by people because of his appearance, and consequently appeals to our capacity for tolerance.
Article commissioned by P3Art
Notice: Séverine Fromaigeat, translation: Matthew Cunningham

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