Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma
"Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma" (1994) an installation by Paul McCarthy, presented during DEAF95.
Paul McCarthy: Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma
With his Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma, Paul McCarthy shows that interfaces don't always have to be a complicated business. Contact with the world of this American artist is established by dressing in red&yellow coveralls, enormous red plastic shoes and a mask with a long tube for a nose. Dressed in this low tech interface the audience can see on video how another Pinocchio - Paul McCarthy himself - covers himself in ketchup and chocolate paste.
The installation is characteristic for McCarthy's vision and that of his pupil Mike Kelly. For more than twenty years, McCarthy has done performances and installations using recognizable puppet figures. A rabbit with a yardlong penis or an idyllic garden where a man becomes one with nature by sticking his penis in a hole in a tree. His images always at first appeal to a beautiful fairy tale world. Immediately afterwards they become slightly shocking with their references to the rancid or animalistic that is hidden directly behind the benign facade. The Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma installation will, as an interface according to McCarthy's vision, make visitors think twice about whether or not the fairy-tale world they were extras in was nothing but one big lie which, in any case, would explain the long nose on their masks.
