Mock up

Czech artist Vladimir Turner’s inflatable mock-up of a nodding donkey oil pump has a prominent location at the foot of the inclined ore elevator at the Völklingen Ironworks. It proudly stands on the roof of a former control room – or, at least, it does so as long as the weather plays its part. This is because solar power is used to inflate the mock-up and make it move. In the absence of enough renewable energy, however, the system collapses – an allegory explicitly intended by the Prague-based artist. Our planet, he suggests, has now reached this point. Mock up also makes it clear that the transition from fossil fuels may entail certain sacrifices. At the same time, he sees the work as symbolic of the practice of greenwashing in politics and commerce. Turner’s activist art calls for an end to fossil-fuel capitalism and asks us to acknowledge the full consequences of such a commitment: “If we want a future, I fear that we will have to do without private motorised transport, which is a huge, unsustainable luxury.”

Daniel Bauer