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Item: Pilots and stewardesses

Sergey Bratkov / Сергій Братков

2003

Photography, 7 x (40 x 30 cm).
Materials: photo on aluminium

Collection: M HKA, Antwerp / Flemish Community (Inv. no. BK007497).

The narrative tradition of a specifically Russian heroism is the central pictorial or scenographic motif in the series Pilots and Stewardesses. The series consists of seven pictures of children, with the boys dressed up as pilots and the girls dressed up as stewardesses, giving them the appearance of adults, depicted as heroes. The series comments on the influence of the mass media on the perception of the individual through advertisement, kitsch, beauty pageants and Hollywood movies. Children tend to mimic the constructed, 'perfect' world that is suggested by advertising. Bratkov shows the irony and absurdity of this act of mimicry.

 

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The M HKA is a museum for contemporary art, film and visual culture in its widest sense. It is an open place of encounter for art, artists and the public. The M HKA aspires to play a leading role in Flanders and to extend its international profile by building upon Antwerp's avant-garde tradition. The M HKA bridges the relationship between artistic questions and wider societal issues, between the international and the regional, artists and public, tradition and innovation, reflection and presentation. Central here is the museum's collection with its ongoing acquisitions, as well as related areas of management and research.

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