The Lonely Stoney Men of Kaokoland
Scattered across the remote North Western corner of Namibia lie (or stand or sit) some 37 stone men (possibly more, possibly less – no-one really knows). These half-size statues, comprising stone and steel, started appearing a few years ago amidst great secrecy. The artist prefers to remain anonymous and rumour has it that he/she works on an installation during the dead of night, welding the stone man into position without anyone’s knowledge.
The artist is reputed to move the statues from time to time, locations aren’t disclosed and travellers don’t readily share GPS co-ordinates. Some are quite easy to spot from the main track, others are more hidden and/or less accessible. We managed to spot 12 and were quite pleased with that! We met a young Italian couple at the first statue we found. “How many have you found?” Francine enquired. “ALL of them”, Marco assured us emphatically! As he is curating a photo exhibition of Lone Men for the 2023 Biennale in Venice, we would hope that he is correct!
Using rocks from the area, the artist has created figures which blend in perfectly with their surroundings. Each has a unique pose and is tagged with a number and message (like “Send Greetings to 1”). Some are passively waiting; some are actively in motion; some are contemplative; some are just about hanging on! But all are alone. Given the isolated and unforgiving landscape you can’t help but hope that at least a couple of them meet each other soon!
How bizarre!
I think they are beautiful, I’d love one in the garden, probably look better in their own environment though.
Take care
Looking forward to the next instalment.
Thanks Pauline,
They do blend in perfectly with their desert environment. 🙂
x
Absolutely incredible! An artist has done some wire sculptures of mostly birds and dotted them along our waterfront area, absolutely stunning how they’ve blended them into the waterfront too.
I love a bit of “surprise” sculpture, especially when the artist uses materials from the same area, 🙂
x
They are amazing. It’s just not what you expect, which makes it even more special.
Absolutely!x
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Absolutely amazing. I am always so fascinated by these lonely lone men!
I see there are now 37 according to this source. Can somebody who has seen them all please send me a full set of the pictures. I want to see if I can discover them all. Going to Kaokoland again soon.
bruce@headout.co.za
As far as I know, they come and go – the artist moves them around, some get stolen, etc etc. But its real fun to find them!!
AN AFRIKABURNER
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