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Our friends and The Morning News have done a lovely interview with Kent Rogowski, an artist who’s taken a bunch of thrift store teddy bears, gutted them, then photographed them inside out. The images are uniquely strange, and kind of mesmerizing. I’ve posted some pics and a clip from the interview here, but you can see more of the interview and images at TheMorningNews. Link via Boingboing.
“What I find most interesting is the different ways that adults and children look at the images. I think adults are much more likely to find the work disturbing or threatening because of the meaning that they place onto the teddy bear. To them the gesture of turning a teddy bear inside-out is confrontational, and cannot be separated from the images. Children look at the bears and see something strange but ultimately still cute, funny, and approachable…”
So, do you think they’re intriguing or disturbing? Let us know in the comments below. (I’m voting intriguing.)
Comments (25)
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i’ll go with intriguing with a side of sad…
posted by mri on 7-9-2007 at 7:28 am
Intriguing with a little macabre and whimsical thrown in.
posted by Lisa on 7-9-2007 at 7:38 am
I would say that it is the teddy bear equivalent of Gunther von Hagens’ plastination.
posted by n2y2 on 7-9-2007 at 9:26 am
I dunno why i’m bothered by these images, but they are just sad to me…I’m sure its because of the attachment I put on a teddy bear…kids are resiliant, but if you made them watch while you cut up THEIR bear and turned it inside out, i bet they’d feel a little differently…
posted by donner on 7-9-2007 at 11:30 am
Definitely disturbing and sad really. Something about stuffed animals being gutted always makes me a little weepy.
posted by Gussie on 7-9-2007 at 11:54 am
What could be disturbing about eviscerating and everting a symbol of comfort and companionship for a child?
I’m sure it meets some deep-seated need for the artist, but not for this cowboy.
posted by Tom on 7-9-2007 at 12:52 pm
I’m falling between interested and slightly scared. I kept trying to determine what the bears looked like originally. Was anyone else doing that?
posted by Mej on 7-9-2007 at 2:01 pm
Does a teddy bear find his inner cub when forced to look inside himself?
posted by Crystal Pete on 7-9-2007 at 4:50 pm
Creepy. Definitely creepy.
posted by Andrea on 7-9-2007 at 9:02 pm
Some day I’ll come up with my own artistic gimmick, and I’ll have my 15 minutes of making people cringe, Oops, I mean my 15 minutes of fame.
posted by Tdave on 7-10-2007 at 12:26 am
I just looked at them and thought, “oh, that’s how they are constructed.” And, “this is what the underpaid sweatshop workers see everyday.”
Can’t say I saw art.
posted by Julianna on 7-10-2007 at 6:23 am
n2y2- Totally agree! Absolutely intriguing in that sense… but without the lovely details! *grins*
posted by Jasper on 7-12-2007 at 9:04 am
It’s a freaking TEDDYBEAR! A piece of fabric that is cut, sewn and shaped into something familiar. The fact that people are disturbed, saddened or otherwise emotionally moved by this escapes me. My son, when he was younger, had a favorite T-shirt…and it got beaten literally to rags…turned inside out over and over…nothing disturbing about that! Or how about when we eat a lobster or a crab? We crack it open and scoop out it’s remains…nothing disturbing there either…we do it over a glass of wine and good conversation! Last, and this is my personal favorite….we go to the museum and look at skeletons of animals, people and dinosaurs…and whoa, not even that’s disturbing!!! So c’mon now people, really…let’s focus on the reality that a stuffed animal, for all it’s fluffy cuteness is really only a small step removed from the piece of cowhide leather chamois that I use to wipe my car down after washing it. Nothing more…nothing less.
Peace.
posted by Scott on 7-12-2007 at 9:41 am
Oh, and one other little thing…Freddy Krueger & Hannibal Lecter would disturbing to a child too…that’s why I don’t let them see them….just a thought when feeling sadness or concern for how this would affect a child.
Peace.
posted by Scott on 7-12-2007 at 9:55 am
I’m going with sad. Who does that to a beloved childhood toy? It’s like The Velveteen Rabbit if it were a horror movie instead of a children’s book. NOT art.
posted by Julie on 7-12-2007 at 10:18 am
I think it’s brilliantly funny! It seems to me the artist is poking fun at the macabre — and weirdly popular — “Bodies” exhibit. What’s weird is not this spoof; what’s weird is that people all over the world are lining up in droves to see “Bodies.”
posted by BLT on 7-12-2007 at 3:20 pm
Definitely disturbing, sad, creepy, all that. I wasn’t so much trying to figure out what they (should)look like; I was gripped by the feeling of need to put them back the way they are suppose to be. Sorta like feeling compelled to straighten a crooked picture, but more intense. I really appreciate what Tom said 7/9. That’s a REAL cowboy!
posted by Martha Geoghegan on 7-12-2007 at 4:02 pm
i don’t find em disturbing. barely intriguing. the white one looks perty cool tho, wouldn’t mind having that sit on my shelf.
they dont look sad to me. the white one more or less makes me think of a mental patient, who prolly is too crazy to be sad.
posted by tick on 7-12-2007 at 7:14 pm
I think they are cute! They still look soft and cuddly. It is too bad that things that are different are quickly labeled disturbing.
posted by penny on 7-12-2007 at 7:34 pm
I didn’t think it looked interesting or cute. Just kind of weird. I also think watching someone eat a lobster is “off putting” and disturbing too. I don’t like lobster and think it’s gross to watch someone tear it apart and eat it. But that’s just my opinion. I’ll leave the lobsters alive at the bottom of the ocean and I’ll take my teddy bears right side out and cute. TYVM
posted by Sheila Gaylord on 7-12-2007 at 7:40 pm
Very disturbing. Teddy bears are supposed to be comforting and now the innards are being exposed to the world! Also, I am a little amazed that someone: a) has the time on their hands to do this kind of project and b) thinks this is art.
posted by Hillary on 7-12-2007 at 9:16 pm
I’ll go with intriguing. It all comes down to that old argument about “what is art?” I wouldn’t do this to my teddy bears but if someone else wants to maybe I’ll go see the exhibit just out of curiosity.
I also saw Bodyworlds by the way. Also very intriguing and not any creepier to me than looking at skelotons of dead animals.
posted by Sarah W on 7-13-2007 at 3:13 pm
The people who are doing this have too much time on their hands.
posted by Jeff Webb on 7-13-2007 at 5:20 pm
Gimmick. Art shows us something about ourselves and/or ‘the human condition’. This just shows us that some people can be conned into believing anything they are told is art really is art. Sort of like the emperor’s new clothes. When I run into things like this at gallery shows and exhibits, I feel insulted, especially if I hear some art critic propounding it’s ‘meaning’ with polysyllabic words. Oh, well, must be time for a sense of humor tune-up!
posted by Savvy on 7-20-2007 at 1:06 pm
for me the very fact that so many people are having an emotional response to the piece confirms that this is “art”; I still have boxes full of stuffed animals, but I don’t find it disturbing, I find it quite intriguing – I am always intrigued by new perspective
posted by Zauzzle on 7-23-2007 at 1:02 pm