TITO/TATA

Inkjet prints, variable dimensions and digital projection, © 2008 Paula Muhr

“Tito-Tata” is a work based on pairing of found images of the Yugoslav communist president Marshall Tito, a famous womaniser and an undying idol of my father, with the business photographs of my father while he was the director of one of the largest state-owned sweets factory in Yugoslavia.

Their striking formal resemblance points to underlying stereotypes governing the convention of representation of the dominant male figures. Images of Tito were taken mostly from the Internet, whereas the images of my father were culled from his private photo album. All the images have poor technical quality, referring to their source – pixels become visible by dramatically enlarging the Tito images, whereas tear and wear of my father’s photos becomes invisible in the form of large scratches and other usage marks.