“My idea was to do a work to provoke Elon Musk,” says Mexican artist Chavis Marmol of his creation of a $40,000 Tesla electric car with a pre-Hispanic-inspired head on display in downtown Mexico City.
A 42-year-old sculptor, Marmol (marble in Spanish) has never owned a car and travels by bicycle. The sculptor used a crane to lower the nine-ton effigy onto a blue Tesla 3, one of the models produced by the American billionaire’s company.
Speaking with Musk in a mocking tone, the Mexican explains the meaning of his artistic approach: “Look what I’m doing with your car with this amazing head, which is bigger than you and has enormous technology”, approached the artist. By AFP in Spain, where he is participating in an exhibition.
His sculpture is inspired by the colossal heads left by the Olmecs, the oldest civilization in present-day Mexico, dating back 3,000 years.
Remnants of the Olmec civilization can be found in the southeast of the country. In 2021, an exhibition was organized at Olmex in Paris.
The work is set in the fashionable Roma district, right in the city center. Just over a year ago, Musk announced the construction of a “megafactory” in the northern industrial capital of Monterrey.
– artistic dream –
The installation, described by some critics as “surreal” or worthy of an “extra-terrestrial” intervention, is hosted by Kolyma 71, an establishment between a classic hotel and an art center.
A video shows the moment the head slowly crushes the roof of the car. Batteries have been removed to prevent any incident.
The first challenge was buying the car, which costs $40,000 on the used market. The name of the patron who made the work possible has been withheld.
The next challenge was finding the stone. With an initial weight of 12 tons, it weighs only nine tons after the artist carved the skull, wide eyes and thick lips.
Colima 71’s artistic director, Margarita Onge, says she “fell in love with the artist’s work”. “What do I think when I see that? What does Tesla mean to me? What does the establishment of the Tesla factory in Monterey mean? What does Musk inspire us to do?” she asks.
Infuriated, the sculptor claims he had nothing to do with seeing $40,000 go up in smoke because “it wasn’t my money”. “That’s the wonderful side of art, you can allow yourself to do these great things.”
In Mexico, “VIP” art (video, installation, exhibition) is denounced as pretense by the critic Evelina Lesper, who in 2022 published an essay against the “fraud of contemporary art”.
VIP art is “false art supported by mediocrity, economic speculation and favoritism,” she attacked.
“If a work of art touches you enough to feel or think, I believe it has served its purpose, and there are not many questions to ask about price or value”, asserts Margarita Ong against possible criticisms against Marmol’s work.
The idea is apparently that the provocative image of a crushed Tesla reaches Elon Musk. “It will be incredible for him to see his car in this condition,” smiles the art director.
Published March 15 at 8:42 p.m., AFP
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