Soviet statues as comedy fountains

I'm not clear on whether this Cracked.com image is a photoshop job or an actual fountain somewhere in the world (the former USSR?) or just a clever idea for repurposing all that Stalin-era monumentary, but it's sure a fine idea. I once got to visit the Soviet theme-park outside of Budapest, which is basically a giant field filled with Soviet-era statues, and it was a kind of Stalinist Easter Island experience, all these nigh-identical socialist realist piles looking bravely into the future. But this is even better.

Craptions Feb 25th, 2010 (via Making Light)

Previously:

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Anonymous

Spitting leaders by Fernando SÃ¡nchez Castillo
Anonymous

There’s a lovely Lenin statue up in Seattle. It was rescued from a scrap yard by Lewis Carpenter, an American teacing English in Slovakia. When Carpenter was later killed in a car accident, Lenin was essentially stranded on a corner in the eccentric Seattle neighborhood of Fremont. Outside of a gelato place.

They drape him in Christmas lights in December, they dress him in drag for Gay Pride Week, locals loiter around him on their smoke-breaks. I have a feeling that Lenin himself would rather have been melted down.
Anonymous

Real! I saw those guys in an awesome park in Arnhem in the Netherlands.
Terry

I seriously want one of these in my back yard.
kaffeen

Great picture, just add a thought bubble: “Christ, what an asshole!!!”
- Anonymous
  
  Wtf
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Fucking statues, how do they work?
bedheaded

It’s “Spitting Leaders” by Fernando SÃ¡nchez Castillo.

http://artkrush.com/gallery/88/feature/8/Fernando-Sanchez-Castillo.html
Tdawwg

“In Soviet Russia, fountain spit on you!”
Marcel

No, actually, the cookies were made by our girl scout from America.
Dr Shock

It is both, the statues are from an exhibition in Arnhem The Netherlands. But Stalin has been twisted in Photoshop in order to spit on Franco I believe it was.
You can read about the exposition in 2008 here:
http://www.sonsbeek2008.nl/read/en/home
You can see the original pictures I took here on flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ectweb/sets/72157623751609065/
Enjoyed the exposition very much, take care,

Walter van den Broek aka Dr Shock
- Anonymous
  
  I believe it is a “pure” photo. The angle of shot and progress of the spray is what makes it look like Stalin is dissin’ Franco. Had the shutter moved a fraction of a second later, I belive it would have been apparent the water was passing in front of the other statue.
pato pal ur

Hate to be the annoying pedant, but technically Budapest’s Memento Park isn’t a “Soviet theme-park” but a place where statues and monuments from Hungary’s Communist era are collected. (There are a few Soviet-themed statues there, but most of them are not.)

Some of these statues are still out there in their original place, believe it or not. Last weekend I stayed at a rustic campsite in eastern Hungary and to my shock in the middle of the campgrounds stood a huge statue of Lenin, outstretched hand to greet us! No idea why he still stands there 20 years after Communism ended in this country…
- Anonymous
  
  Because he’s got nowhere else to go.
Darran Edmundson

About ten years ago, I spent a scary number of hours trying to source a giant Stalin monument and get it shipped to Australia. The idea was to anchor it in 30 meters of water as a dive site â€¦ here (http://tinyurl.com/stalinatsea).
Alex

@pato pal ur #8

Regarding why Lenin is still there after the fall of communism… I was in Russia a couple years ago, and we asked why, with not a Stalin to be seen, there were still Lenins in abundance. The general opinion was that Stalin was a ruthless dictator best not commemorated, but Lenin has become a sort of kitschy Uncle Sam. Some people are not particularly keen at the continued presence of Lenins, but the tourists get a kick out of it, so they leave them up.
Ugly Canuck

The stodgy stasis of the turgid Soviet-realist iron statuary delightfully clashes with the fluid mellifluous dynamism of the moving and noisy water…and also reminds us that water with all its yielding always dissolves iron with all its rigidity and apparent strength, given enough time (and the right atmosphere helps too).

Hopeful and happy fountains, IMO.
Anonymous

There’s a statue of Lenin, holding a shopping bag, ontop of the gift shop of the RAF museum Cosford.
Anonymous

In Moscow there is indeed the Fallen Monument Park, which is chock full of Soviet-era (and Soviet-themed) statuary.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallen_Monument_Park
Anonymous

Most statues of Stalin were taken down during de-Stalinization starting in the 50s. I was told the statue of Stalin in Gori (Stalin’s birthplace in the Caucasus Republic of Georgia) was the only remaining standing statue of him.
Wuss Brillis

On YT it gets really funny:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPqS5-OgZbk

I will practice.