About the Elvis-project:

"For a dead man Elvis Aron Presley is awfully noisy. His body may have failed him in 1977, but today his spirit, his image, and his myths do more than live on: they flourish, they thrive, they multiply. Elvis has become inseparable from many of the defining myths of US culture, enmeshed with the American dream and the very idea of the "United States," caught up in debates about race, gender, and sexuality, and the wars over what constitutes a national culture".

Gilbert Rodman

I have since 1995 been working with an art project concerning the phenomenon and myth Elvis Presley. I look upon him as the consumer society's Jesus and the media as myth-creators. I think we live in an era where we get our energy from entertainment, media reality and popular culture. Elvis is the perfect symbol for that society in which we live. He was the greatest personality in our century and maybe we are all Elvis' cultural inheritors, without knowing it?


Just as it is said that the story of Christ may bee the world's best known story, it can be said that the portraits of Elvis are among the most famous images. Since the death of Elvis Aron Presley in 1977, his persona has been transformed from star to legend to myth to icon. Elvis have come to be known more or less globally by only one name like Jesus, Napoleon or Rasputin. And Elvis belongs to the even smaller and more elite rank of those who are forever known as the inhabitants of empty tombs, again like Jesus. As with mythological processes, the time has passed for concern about the truth or fiction of various details of the life of Elvis. They have transcended the specific. We read of Elvis being sacrificed for our sins like a martyr in many statements and in the ideas expressed by some visitors to Graceland at Tribute Week, the cultural event commemorating Elvis' death. The reality of Elvis' life is less important than the way in which he is pictured. Stories told about him and scholarly analyses by specialists, from technologist to psychologists to literary critics, tell us of his image carrying and mirroring the needs and projections of a culture in the midst of upheaval and value shifts. Elvis is doing OK! We are worse off who can't admit that Hollywood movies and love songs touch us more than classical music and modern art. Elvis was the first and the biggest superstar in this century, and the first one on the market doing commercials for products like lemonade and washing powder. As an individual person, he has changed American culture more than anybody else, but at the same time he has got so little appreciation and respect for it. He challenged his own time on issues like race, class, sex, nation and religion, and in fact, he still does. The newest, most sensational and controversial incarnations of Elvis is the constant growing Elvis cult.

But a lot of people want to relieve Elvis of cultural value, because he is so popular, and they are not taking the Elvis cult and culture seriously, why is that so difficult? It's a question of high and low culture, the cultivated culture audience are protecting themselves from distinct and moving nearness. Appealing to hearts, which Elvis did, means the same as butter up on people, and so mass production is the opposite to culture. But in these global and pluralistic times in which we live, we think this way of thinking has died out, and that every "low" genre has got it's dignity.

Elvis is worshiped by people who are even not interested in music, listen to the numbers speaking: Today there are more then 550 active Elvis' fan clubs all over the world, with more than 1 000 000 members. No other living or dead person have more organized fans. 750 000 people visit Graceland every year, and that makes it the USA's most visited private home, after the White House. 50 000 mourning persons turned up at the 10 year anniversary for Elvis' death, 100 000 turned up at the 25 year anniversary in 2002, while the equivalent mark of occasion of John Lennon, only gathered a few hundred. The Elvis audience also becomes younger and more complex, only 10-15 % fits into the old cliche; middle aged, white trash women which have lost the hero from their early years. There are skinheads, teddy boys, heavy-rockers, hipsters, but most of all normal middle-class people. The majority is in fact 20 to 30 years old, and Graceland receives fan mail every day from youth and children, which was not even born when Elvis died in 1977.

It's hard to see how strongly Elvis contributed to shape the symbol landscape in which we live. Every disgraceful move Elvis turned into mainstream, has now become a convention. The same with Elvis, he has got to become an old acquaintance, who is always there, but people don't know much about him. He has become a conception, a category. "Elvis has left the building" is a well used formulation in who knows how many movies.

The Tragedy:
Personally I think the Elvis-Jesus incarnation is most interesting, and that has been generally through all my art projects. My first exhibit, act 1 was in 1995: "Elvisjesus", was a wax-sculpture of Elvis in a light blue Las Vegas- jumpsuit, standing on the water, in a little lake, in the center of the city. Finally, at the day of the unveiling ceremony, the sculpture had disappeared! The media grabbed the case, and it was continually on the news in the radio, every half an hour. People called the radio station, and said they had seen Elvis walking around in different places in the city and country. The police was driving around the city looking for Elvis. At last the police got a anonymous phone call, saying that; 3 girls had been swimming out there (150 meters, 4 am in the morning and drunk) because they thought it was Jesus who were standing on the water. They nearly drowned when they reached to him and grabbed him, so Elvis saved their lives, but gave his in return, and disappeared into the deep of the lake. Marine divers found Elvis floating on 8 meters depth, with his arms heroic outstretched. The story was all over the news, even NTB was spreading it to Germany and France.

My second Elvis- project, act 2, was "Elvis Aroannes" in 1996, at the Aquarium in Bergen. Here another Elvis wax-sculpture in a dazzling white jumpsuit, was sitting crouched and imprisoned in one of the biggest aquariums, under water. This idea I developed from the "Elvisjesus", like a continuation of a story. Like "Eyes Blue Ice" this installation also puts the audience involuntary into a position of mourning over this helpless individual, who is captured in his own performance.

Like all the different fishes and species, Elvis Aroannes also had a Latin title: membra paluda est, beluae submergoae, and a text:

"This example of species was observed the first time standing on Lille Lungårdsvann in Bergen in the middle of June 1995. Three persons swam out to examine the Jesus-like appearance, thereby finding out that it was Elvis. These persons were later on saved from drowning by E., when they could not make it back because of exhaustion. E. Then disappeared into the depth and a big rescue-search was launched. The phenomenon was found suspended in the water with his arms stretched out holding his cape. Elvis has both before and after appeared in many places without it ever having been confirmed. This example that is being shown here is the only one that so far has been verified. Because of this, we can not say anything about the number of species that exist in the world, where to seek out for them or the expected age. This type of phenomena has never been captured or exhibited alive before. That is why we are very pleased to present this historical event to you." ( Fire, Air, Earth, Water)

The next exhibition, act 3 in this series was called "Evils Priestly", 1997. Here Elvis had the jumpsuit called "Black Butterfly". This was actually a professional performance actor, who is also an Elvis-imitator, who I hired to do this performance. The doubtful, black and evil Elvis was captured in the 1000 years old dungeon in the Rosenkrantz tower (a National Historical Monument, King's castle), sitting there making strange and evil sounds, sometimes screaming out loudly and sometimes crying vulnerably. This was in August in the busiest tourist season, so many people had a strange experience, which they had not expected to get here.

Act 4 I called "Levis Vergil" , the night before Christmas Eve, 1997. This was like a public execution in purgatory. A wax-sculpture of Elvis was standing in his cadmium red jumpsuit called "Burning Love", in the middle of a circle of burning flames, behind big fences. This happened in the center of the city, called Torgallmenningen, when the panic-shopping was on its worst. Elvis was really suffering a lot, like Jesus on the cross, I think almost 10 000 persons were witnessing this consumers' society's God-appearance.

Act 5, last act of a tragedy, was " Elvis Testimony": The lookalikes, comes in all shapes and ages. They drives around the city in limousines, and plays bowling, goes to amusement parks and eats at Burger King. They do all the things Elvis Enjoyed to do. I have used the Elvis-imitators to get publicity to my projects, i look upon them as living pictures, and the fact that the myth and phenomenon has reached new dimensions. Elvis-imitators constitute one of the world's most misunderstanded minority-groups, generally disliked also by Elvis-fans, who think they degrade themselves and the King. The large number of Elvis- imitators is without parallels in the world history. Never ever have so many people wanted to imitate a dead person. The reserve kings come in all ages, colours and sizes. There are Asian Elvises, women-Elvises, children-Elvises, bodybuilding-Elvises and Elvises in wheelchairs. Some of them have a lot of humour, and some of them don't know that they are funny at all. But they all represent the legend alive, in closeness, Elvis who breaths and sweats, Elvis who talks and laughs, Elvis who flirts and answers shouts from the audience. If you don`t join us, you`re against us!

The Cover stories:
In accordance to classical modernistic ideas, I have seeked to reach more people than only the traditional art audience, so these projects above was mostly presented outdoor in the public eye, in places people are not expecting to see art presented. Then I have made a "cover-story" for the galleryes, installations for art institutions: the first Installation in 1996 was "Burger King" an Elvis altar, a gold bust of Elvisjesus with a half eaten hamburger from Burger King. Here the audience could pay a little money to get incense and lights and kneel on a royal red carpet before the altar decorated with Hawaii flowers and wreaths.

"Burning Love", Installation 1997, a relic: I made a copy of the original "Burning Love", jumpsuit, an outfit with allusions to knights and cardinals. The shoes are made in Germany, exact copy of the original Elvis-shoes. The cape with white silk lining has a sun symbol on it, witch means the one who lightens up the dark. The sculpture stands behind a 8 mm thick, dark and sooty, bulletproof showcase. It stands on a 45 cm tall black marble pedestal. The pretended attitude of the figure is like it' ready to grab the revolver, pull the trigger and shoot himself out trough the glass. The headless sculpture represents what's left of Elvis, the myth and the image, and what lives on.

"Eyes Blue Ice", Installation 1998. Here the audience look upon a sarcophagus in a dark, icecold room, and involuntary they are put in a position of mourning over this body, frozen in an iceblock, lying in state of "lit de parade". Immortality and heroic worship concretizes and continues in this experience of solemnity and distance.

"Evils Priestly", Installation 2002. Black Butterfly jumpsuit- It`s very hard to live up to an image.

This Installation is a mix between Elvis, Batman, Dracula and Bruce Lee- mirror senario in the movie "Enter the Dragon."

The Elvis-sculpure in the "Black Butterfly"- jumpsuit is beeing reflected in a 3,5x1,7 m big Mirror-screen.

"Angel", Installation 2003. The figure is finished but not all complete yet with the blue glass showcase, wich is how I`m gonna present it in a gallery.

The Elvis-project has got a lot of attention in the media and of course the media has been the myth-creator part in my project. I think that involving the media in art projects, is very difficult, but a new and very modern way of thinking at the art scene. It's very hard, but interesting to try to control the "Media God" through art research developing to art projects. I`m meeting a lot of resistance and it's very hard to be taken seriously, which I think is a very interesting way of presenting the problem.

Quotation and sources:
Gilbert Rodman
Kjetil Rolness
Vernon Chadwick
Griel Marcus