The imaginative, strange childhood dreams of twins Nikolai and Simon Haas materialize in a large-scale exhibition at Blanton Museum of Art. Working as the Haas Brothers, the siblings have been collaborating since 2010 and are widely known for their fantastical sculptures of flora and fauna with their signature cheeky, surreal twist. In Austin, the Los Angeles artists present a range of figurative furniture, plush cartoonish characters, and illuminated installations that showcase their idiosyncratic aesthetic.
Previously on view at Cranbrook Art Museum and the Museum of Art and Design in New York, Uncanny Valley is the first mid-career survey for the duo, presenting a range of their quirky, genre-defying works. The exhibition also nods to the brothers’ childhood in Austin, where they lived from age 3 to 19, a time when the unofficial city slogan “Keep Austin Weird” became a cultural ethos and early influence.
Interested in technology and its implications, the artists frequently engage with the strange intersection of the artificial and the natural. The duo’s brilliant and bizarre strawberry tree, for example, appears as if transplanted from another planet into the gallery. In a statement for the show, Simon elaborates:
The ‘uncanny valley’ generally refers to robotics, where empathy for a robot increases the more human you make it—up to a point. When the robot becomes too human, empathy switches to revulsion. The solution for this is to add cuteness: when a robot is humanoid with an extra dose of cuteness, empathy for the object skyrockets. Looking at our 15-year career from a bird’s-eye view, the ‘uncanny valley’ came into focus as a core theme.
Uncanny Valley is on view in Austin through January 17, when it will travel to its final location, Mint Museum in Charleston. Find the accompanying monograph of the same name on Bookshop.
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