Mr. Joseph's Last Will (1990)

Overview

One of the three epitaphs that Robakowski created between 1966 and 1994, in an installation entitled Mr Deer (Self-Epitaph). The static shot from a bird’s-eye perspective shows the artist lying on a red and pink carpet with deer antlers attached to his head. Holding a burning cigarette in his mouth and exhaling smoke, the performer delivers a longer, unintelligible monologue; the words are gibberish, as if he were speaking with his mouth full. Robakowski commented on his self-epitaph: “Today, after almost thirty years, another epitaph appears, this time of ‘Mr Deer’, to personify the desire for arrogant gestures. It is meant to decry the miserable fate of the contemporary artist as a naïve fool, a bootlicker and creator of beautiful ideas and things…”.