The absurd humour of the artist brothers Plonk & Replonk from La Chaux-de-Fonds is notorious in western Switzerland and in France, where they have turned museums upside down. The artists “cartoon collages” in the style of hand-coloured post cards from the turn of the 20th century make fun of everyone and everything. Their art objects are three-dimensional caricatures: brass flip-flops, porcelain ping-pong balls, and garden gnomes set in concrete. Plonk & Replonk invented the King of Switzerland and are in the process of patenting Tuesday. The subtly altered post cards and historical photographs peppered with puns present a whimsical image of Switzerland and make deep scratches in the shiny surface of majestic mountain tops, executive suites, proud military men, well-behaved citizens and outdated clichés. The Cartoonmuseum Basel pays homage to Plonk & Replonk with the first major retrospective on the German-speaking side of the “Röstigraben”. As a special treat for Basel, the artists have put together a series of works dealing with the particularities of the city on the Rhine.
Curator: Anette Gehrig