In the last few days when the scandal over Entropa errupted, David Černý and his colleagues swore they really did try to find 27 European artists, who could take part in the project. But now the creative team has admitted that the project was to be a hoax from the very beginning.
In several interviews, including one with Týden.cz, David Černý said he initially wanted to carry out the project as agreed with Deputy PM Alexandr Vondra: to approach one artist in each of the 27 EU countries and ask them to create a caricature of their own country. He said he spent “about a week” calling around but then found that it was too difficult and so decided to do the caricatures himself (in collaboration with his team).
“That’s not what happened,” Entropa co-author Tomáš Pospiszyl told Týden and Týden.cz. “David’s word choice was unfortunate. We knew from the beginning when we started collaborating on the project in February 2008 that we wanted it to be a mystification. The time and financial constraints wouldn’t have been a problem. It would have been possible to call 27 artists and ask them to come up with something, but we thought it would be far more interesting intentionally create a hoax and play with public reactions.
Surprisingly, David Černý seems the most quiet and careful about the project out of the team of authors. Almost as if he got scared of all the commotion that he initially wanted to create. According to information available to Týden, he decided to spend three weeks in the United States after unveiling Entropa, so that he wouldn’t need to explain anything. Entropa may have generated a lot of publicity, but it remains to be seen how it could influence the course of his future career. Czech millionaires, who have been buying up Černý’s sculptures to show that they support non-conformist art, as well as the government, which was to employ Černý for the World Expo in 2010, might not believe a thing Černý says from now on.
