‘Frustration over US policies’ behind Melania Trump’s statue, says artist Melania Trump

American artist behind the controversial statue of US First Lady Melania Trump, His native Slovenia unveiled the bronze this week, Defended the work as a representation of her husband’s presidential contradiction.

Brad Downey, a Fictional artist from Berlin-based Kentucky, Replacing the wood carving that was destroyed in a fire attack in July, said the statue was inspired by his “frustrations with the policies of the country of my birth.”

“On the one hand we keep people in cages on the U.S. border with Mexico, on the other hand, what is my clear contradiction, we have the first woman for whom English is not her mother tongue. , Whose U.S. Citizenship was fast on visas reserved for immigrants with extraordinary abilities. At the same time her husband is xenophobic, anti-Islam.

“I felt I could separate this contradiction and make a portrait of it.”

The statue, located on a poplar tree trunk near Sevanika, Trump’s hometown in southeastern Slovenia, is part of a project launched several years ago. It ends in a documentary, Melania, The revered artisan Ale š “Maxi” vupevc, a professional pipe level without any educational art school background, who sculpted the folk art chain in his spare time.

“I chose Maxi from many local artists because of the similarities between her life and Melania,” Downey said. “He was born in the same month and year and in the same hospital. Like her – her father was a mechanic and she grew up in a large family – she belongs to a working class family.

“I took the position that I would not control the aesthetics of the project. I keep an ideological distance, and nothing will force it. I gave her just one photo to work with, the moment she became the first woman. “

Downey bought a tree and cut it down in the right proportions as well as a plot of land on which the statue stands which gave him the right to e bho.

He paid Maxi to make the work, carved from a poplar tree. It shows a wave Melania Trump Dressed in a blue woolen dress.

For a year the carving field received little attention, until Downey arranged an unofficial unveiling, after which it was picked up by the world’s media, who ridiculed much of it. Draw comparisons with everything from smurfs to scarecrows.

“I didn’t plan to make it as a meme,” Downey insisted, “although I don’t think I’m really surprised that it’s so harmonious.” Along with the locals he contacted, they appreciated the monument. “They came for the unveiling and we ate cake – with local melanza tort cream and nuts, and drank wine. My parents and wife flew. People said they liked it, “he said.

But he was horrified by the hate mail, “from the left and the right,” which, with media reactions, he said would be integrated into his ongoing “Melania” documentary series.

“On the one hand, people were criticizing me, and asking: ‘Why did you keep this woman’s monument?’, On the other hand, people were saying, ‘She looks better than him.’

Following the tradition of the propaganda memorial protocol, with a special focus on Cold War era buses and statues, which also defamed communist leaders, Slovenia, Downey made a silicone cast of wooden figurines last year, with a view to making a bronze version of it.

“After Lenin took over Russia after the October Revolution, he ordered the installation of thousands of wooden linins from Kyrgyzstan to Ukraine,” Downey explained. “Over time, they gradually became more permanent bronze. The trend later spread to China. “

While the woodwork melania carvings were burned in an apparent terrorist attack on July 4 this year – some locals, Dunne says, “doubt the CIA’s involvement”, although police have yet to find the culprits – he quickly removed the burning and blistered remains. , Which later Went on display at an art exhibition.

The bronze replica was made during the Covid-19L downdown, which forced him to stay in Slovenia, and was unveiled by Maxi on Wednesday, in the presence of about 20 locals who brought home-made wine with them.

A spokeswoman for the municipality of Sevanica, Melania Trump’s birthplace, Rejected or clarified his statue, Telling the Slovenian daily, Nevenic: “It does not conform to our values ​​of cultivating a sense of belonging to our fellow human beings.”

Downey’s performance in Slovenia, in conjunction with the recent Black Lives Matter protest, has been nicely consistent with the statues’ pp bags, leading to the United States.

“While I agree with the BLM views, however, there is no need to pull down monuments, I thought in this case, this is like a side effect – a monument that is a monument of critique, a concept of power and supports it. ”