Deer TOTEM is a unique work of art

28/09/2021
Zoltán Kovács, government commissioner for the implementation of the ‘One with Nature’ World of Hunting and Nature Exhibition described the welcome gate made from shed antlers as a unique work of art to the highest world standards on Sunday at the HUNGEXPO fair centre in Budapest.

The government commissioner thanked the state forest farms that gathered together half the antlers that were necessary for the statue. The rest of the antlers came from almost all the country’s hunting societies engaged in game management.

He said this is not the final place for the statue as it will be transported to Keszthely where it will be erected in the garden of the Festetics Museum.

Mr Kovács observed that over time the statue will change as the sun will make the antlers fade to white, and so the miraculous hind statue will turn white eventually.

Gábor Miklós Szőke, the artist who made the statue recalled that 2.5 years ago he was asked to make a gate, a gate installation from antlers which would welcome the visitors of the World Exhibition. After just a few meetings, the concept of the miraculous hind statue came into being.

The artist said the miraculous hind is the totem of the Hungarian people, hence the title of the statue: ‘TOTEM’. He added that he had never before worked with antlers which are very exciting materials and there are no two identical ones.

Mr Szőke said the statue made with the use of 10 tonnes of shed antlers forms the shape of a rutting miraculous stag, through the mouth of which visitors can enter the World Exhibition. This is the first thing people see upon entering, and so symbolically it also conveys the message of ‘one with nature’.

He described the collection of antlers as an act of national collaboration, and said the antlers constituting the statue are from red deer, fallow deer and roe bucks.

Source MTI
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