Blue helmets have reached Chicago. As part of the ongoing “Miniscule Blue Helmets on a Massive Quest” project, Dutch artist Pierre Derks has been spreading toy soldiers with painted blue helmets all around the world. An astounding 50,000 soldiers were made, with the intention of raising questions about the real United Nations peacekeepers. So far, blue helmets have been spotted in forty different countries, and here in locations like Millennium Park and along the Chicago River. “The idea of portraying war and militarism in the form of toys intrigues me. Although the world is full of conflicts, the question is if you should get confronted with it in a playful way,” says Derks. “By painting the helmets of the toy army men blue and changing the context by placing them in public space, they loose their innocence and are given a political meaning. I find it fascinating that a tiny brushstroke turn them into a statement or symbol.”
Paint It Blue: Lessons From The Old Guitarist of Pablo Picasso I’ve been looking at this painting since I moved here to study art and philosophy more than thirty years ago. I felt an intimate connection from the moment I first saw it, perhaps because of the painting’s implicit reflection of my own plight as a young artist.
