Rewind: Pablos Portrait

Year:	2007
City:	Vienna, Austria
Measures:	6 pieces, 30 x 45 cm, each
Media:	c-print on enamel
Exhibitions:	Where your feet are standing,... Political Correctness Von der Notwendigkeit, Augen am Hinterkopf zu haben Pandora's Box
Catalogues:	Tanja Boukal: Do you also have pretty motifs? Tanja Boukal - Political Correctness Tanja Boukal: Body of Works 2002-2009 Tanja Boukal: Von der Notwendigkeit, Augen am Hinterkopf zu Haben
Part of a series:	Rewind: Revolution Rewind: Obersalzberg Rewind: Pablos Portrait Rewind: Industry

The first part of the Rewind series shows the estate of Colombian drug baron Pablo Escobar.

In the 1980s, El Patron led the world's largest and most powerful drug cartel. Although he was responsible for the deaths of thousands of people - not only through the drugs he distributed, but also through targeted contract killings of people he wanted out of the way - his fame is not entirely negative. Escobar invested several million dollars in the development of schools, parks, churches, and housing projects for the poor population of his hometown of Medellín. The Hacienda Nápoles he built was left to decay after his assassination.

Boukal's use of antiquated sepia tones counteracts the temporal perception of his photographs. The apparently contemporary decay of the buildings and the ancient appearance of the photographs contradict each other. This effect is intensified as soon as the viewer realizes that the artist has breathed life back into the ruins in colored details, which actually predate the decay. The fireproof email on which the paintings are applied refers to the history of the Hacienda in its function as a protective coating against the corrosion of the support material.

Despite the building's decay, the ambivalent fame of Pablo Escobar remains unbroken.