The Half Blood Prince wipes the floor performing ‘The Drainbow Connection’ LIVE on Massey’s Next Top Artist
A 3D print of pepe frog rides around on a roomba playing an interpretation of ‘The Rainbow Connection’ by Kermit the Frog.
He is a ghostly white for the most part, save for his red lips. Noticebly, in the center of his lips, there is a heart shape in the negative space of the paint work. Between this and the use of the ‘prince’ in the title we recall the myth of the princess and the frog, that the princess must kiss the frog in order for him to be transformed back into a prince. This takes trust, and intimacy with something repulsive.
His arm is also red, in a composition that mimics that of Pierre Huyghe’s dog with a pink leg.
This dog named ‘human’ lives in Huyghe’s exhibtions and there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the ethics of the animal’s use in exhibitions.
This redness also invokes ideas of guilt ‘blood on your hands’ ‘out damned spot’ It also acts as an arm band, fascistic in nature. it’s unclear what the message is, its there to confuse, to send people in circles. People’s own politics are brought into question as they contend with the work.
He rides around aimless, lost in the gallery space, he sings the Rainbow connection. A beautiful song about chasing ‘the dream’ as it is co opted and used to manipulate through a misleading ideology. Following the lineage between Kermit as a mostly pure romantic lamenting the loss of inocence and encouraging the cultivation of hope within that - to this more tumultous frog who’s meaning seems to fluctuate along with the whims of the internet.
This cluster of signs and symbols form a network that trancends the borders of politics but all talk to the idea of the contingent nature of language. Is pepe losing his colour, or in the process of becoming red? Do we need to come erotically close with the opposition in order to fully concquer it as Berardi says? Where do we place hope and rehabilitation in this maelstrom of information and ideology? it can seem aimless.futile at times.
Someday we’ll find it, the rainbow connection
the lovers, the dreamers and me.















