RON VOLKAINE
AMSTERDAM - NEW YORK

ART UNITES EUROPE

>> More then 750 people painted an artwork on my car to remember Europe before the introduction of the Euro.

Intro

Rotterdam, 30-12-2001

In the summer of 2000 I travelled to all capitals of the European memberstates to gather the pictures from Europe before the Big Bang. Together with 750 people I made the first People's Art artwork in history. This artwork is an unique painting which shows the needs, thoughts, emotions and the imagination of 750 people of the different European Countries before they will be swallowed by the European Community on 1 January 2002 when we will start to use one currency: the Euro.

The Big Bang 

The Euro will swallow the currencies of the old cultures of Europe. The several European countries fighted like Lions (Netherlands), Eagles (Germany), Cocks (French) and so on to defend and to conquer, to kill and to free in the name of their God and their nation. The flag and the coin represent the nation. The value of the coin is a graduate scale for the state of a nation. That is why the British and the Danish people do not want to take part in the Euro, because they do not want to sell a part of their identity for which they have worked hard generations after generations. That is why I wanted to gather the heritage of the people before the end begins. In history people have always chosen a date on which things changed. Very often a person's birth or death marks a new beginning. 1 January 2002 will be the day of birth of the European Community. After this date we will become more homogeneous. The landscape of diversity / variety will change into a flat and unvaried polderlandscape. I know that it has already started with the colonizations of Europe caused by the American Marshall-plan after 1945. New multinationals like MTV, CNN, Mac Donalds, Coca Cola, etc, caused a meltdown of the intellectual heritage of the different cultures into a new European heritage. I do not mean that I am in favour of or against the European Community, I only want to give an objective view of the future, because I am not an politician; I am just an artist. But facts do not lie.

The Paintings 

The paintings made by ordinary people all have a story, a title, a name and an address, because an artwork without data is not reliable anymore in this data-society. A human without 0 en 1, genes and chromosomes is not a human. In fact we are the most artificial computer ever build. Especially in the era of data-communication it is important to have those data. An artwork together with the data is a priceless artwork as invaluable as you are. The pictures in combination with the data is so important because it shows us what the participants made, how many people painted, which colours they preferred, etc. The artwork is a visual result of the effort people made to make this unique artwork which shows that average people prefer figurative art more than abstract art. I have chosen for ordinary people instead of artists because Plato said, that everybody is born with the same cognition. Through education, the cognitive power of artists in the western world became more extremely shaped. To achieve an autonomous art-work which breaks through the homogeneity of those minds, I chose to find people with authentic pictures

This artwork is a new iconoclastic concept which redefines the meaning of art. Many paintings on the car shows hearts, flags, flora and fauna. The most abstract artwork but still a figurative artwork is made by an 80% blind women, named Marie Tys from Brussels, who called here work "The colour of my live". Another very interesting artworks is "Scratch" made by Ketola Olli from Vasa in Finland. This 6 years old boy made an artwork with an exceptional simplicity by just painting a square totally black before he scratched a house, an airplane and a car with the back of his pencil.

The End

Last but not least the car will herald the end of Authentic Europe, the artwork will become a time-statue to which future generations can travel back in time by watching the 750 paintings on this artwork made on the confine of a new millennium and a new civilization.

Yours sincerely,

Ron Volkaine

Ron Volkaine

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