Toy Soldier Barricade

The threat to just about any place in the world where crowds tend to gather has never been greater. Barricades—of concrete, metal, razor wire, and other materials—have become commonplace presences around national monuments, cultural institutions and the epicenters of governmental and financial power. Axis Mundi proposes to literally animate the barricade concept, making it more dynamic, through the versatile use of 7 to 10 toy soldier shapes in oversized attack-formation poses that would be cast from bronze or fabricated in polished stainless steel. These forms immediately arouse nostalgia and patriotism cultivated in the childhoods of many, as well as the sense of security we associated with them when we were young. For those opposed to warlike playthings, the barrels have been left hollow to offer receptacles for flowers. They can be deployed in closed-rank phalanxes or spread out strategically depending on the level of threat. Their sculptural presence not only enlivens mundane, standard-issue barricades, but also serves to incite contemplation of war, our sense of imminent danger and the forces that we imagine represent it, our own ideas of protection and safety…the list of possible inquiries is endless.

Designed by: John Beckmann and Lane Lamerson, with Nick Messerlian and Alyssa Egnew
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