Reimagining an iconic movie villain tn 'The Vader Project'
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"Carmen Mirandarth, 2007" is part of "The Vader Project" at The Andy Warhol Museum."
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Andy Warhol would have loved it -- using a cultural icon and transforming it according to the artist's sensibility. But these are no soup cans.
Darth Vader, the embodiment of evil and redemption in pop culture, was ranked No. 3 on the AFI's list of top 100 movie villains (perhaps the redemption part is what caused voters to pick Hannibal Lecter and Norman Bates Nos. 1 and 2). But in his villainous stage, we know Darth Vader by his hulking size, his sweeping cape and the oversize helmet that helps him breathe.
That helmet forms the foundation of "The Vader Project," an exhibition at The Andy Warhol Museum, North Side, that opens Saturday and runs through May 3. The brainchild of husband and wife Dov Kelemer and Sarah Jo Marks, co-owners of DKE Toys, the exhibition features 100 works that started as to-scale replicas of the Darth Vader helmet of "Star Wars" films that were used as blank canvases for the artists to paint, design and customize.
Kelemer and Marks tapped artists from unconventional art scenes -- rock posters, tattoos, toy design and graffiti -- who had some gallery exposure and acclaim in their fields. Clothing designer Marc Ecko and poster artist Frank Kozik are among the designers. The artists are also known by names such as Shag, Attaboy, Mister Cartoon and Dalek, which sometimes identifies the art and the artists who create it as "underground" or "low brow."
They hate that label, Los Angeles-based Kelemer said by phone on Monday.
"Andy Warhol represented the low brow of his time, now he's the high brow. All these artists are the premiere artists in their field, and many of them don't like that word, low brow, for that reason. What's low brow today is going to be high brow tomorrow, once people figure it out. It's just the evolution of art."
Although The Vader Project and the Warhol might seem like a perfect marriage, it wasn't the artist and the museum that bears his name that attracted Kelemer, whose DKE Toys distributes designer toys and art objects to stores around the world.
It was an e-mail from a "Star Wars" fan.
"It was kind of ridiculous, actually," Kelemer relates. "There was a fan, Christine Anderson, who is the secretary-treasurer of the Star Wars Association of Pittsburgh, and she e-mailed me and said, "I think this needs to come to Pittsburgh."
Anderson took it upon herself to contact Jesse Kowalski, Warhol director of exhibitions, and that got the ball rolling.
That the project has landed in a museum is beyond Kelemer's dreams for the project, which was first exhibited with 66 helmets at a "Star Wars" celebration in Los Angeles in May 2007.
"We were unsure 'Star Wars' fans would appreciate it and that they might think it was weird," Kelemer recalled. Then he saw the line to get into the exhibit, which stretched until some people were waiting for an hour, while pieces from the movies' archives had no waiting time.
"It was fresh, it was new," Kelemer explained. While "Star Wars" imagery lends itself to interpretation, "it had always been very genre-based, with artists from the worlds of science fiction and comic books."
He likens the exhibition to the many citywide exhibitions throughout the country in which 3-D shapes such as angels or cows -- or in the case of Pittsburgh, dinosaurs -- were customized by artists.
That concept has become popular in the designer toy industry, he said, and that's how the idea struck him that Darth Vader's helmet would be the perfect blank canvas.
"It's such an iconic image that anything you do is making a statement. The number of political statements in the show is amazing and some of them can be read so many different ways," he said, pointing out Wade Lageose's Statue of Liberty mask as an example that invites multiple interpretations.
The helmets have traveled the country to conventions, but this is the first time they will be shown in a museum.
"We're obviously very excited to be at the Warhol; that's more than I could have ever hoped to achieve with a show like this," Kelemer said.
"It's amazing for all these artists, who have had gallery shows and are used to being shown, but to be in a museum raises the profile. Many of the artists tell me they get more attention from their Darth Vader helmets than anything they've ever done. This exhibition not only introduces people to artists, it lets people know that there are other kinds of art out there."
For the opening Saturday, museum visitors dressed as a "Star Wars" character get in free and there will be a special Weekend Factory, noon to 4 p.m., where Warhol visitors can create their own collage-drawing masks. Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays; and 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Fridays. Admission: Adults $15, seniors $9, and children/students $8; warhol.org or 412-237-8300.
In addition to the Warhol, Carnegie Science Center will host more than a dozen helmets for the duration of the exhibition.
First Published February 25, 2009 12:00 am
