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Nightmare Playgrounds

CarlosTheDJ

CarlosTheDJ

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Brilliant link, great photos.

Manic-depressive creativity

Granted, some playground sculptures shown here may impress a child with their unapologetic weirdness - but most are so tasteless and ugly that it's bordering on insanity.

A multitude of such bizarre apparitions still exists in the former Communist countries - proving that kids would play in just about any environment. A few statues illustrate the elements of Slavic fairy tales, others make do with miserable (decapitated, or worse) animals and evil-looking, nightmarish characters.
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http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/02/nightmare-playgrounds.html

http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/05/nightmare-playgrounds-part-2.html
 
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Reminds me of the playground sculpture from 'Donnie Darko'. Weird and disturbing.
I don't know if many schools here in the UK have playground sculptures, but it seems to be common elsewhere...
 
that one of the orange man with the horses head growing from his crotch is just plain, um, weird...
 
BlackRiverFalls said:
that one of the orange man with the horses head growing from his crotch is just plain, um, weird...
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It's a horse, actually. Somebody painted a face on it's tail.
 
Yeah, a lot of these would look mundane, if slightly tacky, had they been properly maintained instead of being left to weather and vandals. It's sad that the parents don't have the clout or energy to get the playgrounds looked after.
 
That monkey at the end...that's just...that's not right...not right at all.

What a brilliant site, by the way. Stunning pictures of Armenia somewhere on there and I've just about pissed myself looking at the Faces of the Russian Militia at the end of this page. Thanks for introducing us Carlos.
 
children's playgoround

no wonder children woulde get un-nerved and scared with statue's like that in the playground omst of them are disturbing and the rest are like things i have watched in a horror movie,

they should bever place things of that nature in a children's playground, its both unnecessary and worng, very wrong,

a child's playground is supposed to be a happy and calming place not one were they will be scared to go and play on a ride,

the rabbit does remind me of donnie darko, being a lover of rats the picture of the rat in the trap is not called for its upsetting for me to look at never the less a child, the monkey looks like a gremlin gone wrong, the pictures of the giant bugs look like they are gonna fly away with you, and im not sure if that is supposed to be an elephant with its tongue sticking out or what very confused???? and my god the rabbit taped to a board looks like it's about to have a load of knifes thrown at the poor thing,

and again why are hese allowed to be put in a child's playground?
 
They have a certain appaling appeal.

What is the reasoning behind this? All we had was vandalised play equitment, nothing darkly artistic.

My fave was the climbing frames shaped like an Apollo re entry craft.

Nowaydays its all unappealing grey wooden things
 
i agree kids these kids i think would much prefer the graffiti than these horrible nasty statues i mean come on who in there right mind does that, and i bet they dont have any children,

there the sort of things nightmares are made of not happy playground things

whats wrong with nice woodland creatures, fairy tale characters???
 
Eastern Europe has a different culture, what may be nightmarish to us isn't necessarily so to them. Of more concern to me is the general spikiness of some of them, especially the metal ones; an accident waiting to happen.
It's interesting to speculate though what effect it would have on a developing brain to see something disturbing every day. Perhaps it would have no effect, simply because it was familiar.
 
goth13girl666 said:
whats wrong with nice woodland creatures, fairy tale characters???
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You mean like..... The Singing Ringing Tree? :shock:

Kath
 
Eastern European fairy tales are not as bowlderised as ours.
 
i can clearly see from the images that they have a very different idea to what is nice and child friendly to down right wierd and disturbing,

there culture is obviously alot different to ours and alot more by the looks of things, put most children in to that typre of environment they will think its normal behviour to see thigns like that and may take that in to their adult life which is not a good thing to do
 
Where are you on cartoon violence goth13girl666?

Nice fairies are a very recent invention - and a quite deliberate one I think whereas the unbowdlerised stuff Kondoru is talking about just... well..... just happened I supposed. At least until it was deliberately curated and written down.

Although the REAL stuff from the brothers Grimm is pretty close to the bone sometimes, even once it's been safely caught in a book.

Hang on, am I in the wrong thread?

Kath
 
i think you are in wrong thread :lol:

and cartoon violence is not better than violence in reality
 
stonedog2 said:
goth13girl666 said:
whats wrong with nice woodland creatures, fairy tale characters???
Click to expand...

You mean like..... The Singing Ringing Tree? :shock:

Kath
Click to expand...

Aargh! Did you have to bring that up? I'd nearly forgotten about it! :D
 
there culture is obviously alot different to ours and alot more by the looks of things, put most children in to that typre of environment they will think its normal behviour to see thigns like that and may take that in to their adult life which is not a good thing to do
Click to expand...

Well, look at it this way:

http://www.fln.vcu.edu/struwwel/daumen_dual.html

Take a look at that. I encountered that at primary school and it made me the man I am today. Really. Hoffmann wanted to write a book that stimulated the imagination and appealed to the inherent cruelty of children while guiding them towards a moral. Central European children's literature is thus.

Of course, I am also scared cackless of having my bits cut off, and so wear mittens to this day.
 
well i guess there is that way at looking at it but at the same time not everyone is going to react to it in that way and not everyone will grow up lokking at it in a positive way like you have.
 
Unless they grew up being told it's fine. And then they become adults who think it's fine, and show it to their kids who are fine with it and in the end, everyone and everything is fine.

Wow I used that word a lot.
 
Yes, to say it's all horrible is wee bit culturally imperialistic no?

Kath
 
no i dont think think it is dont our children go through and see enough in life without this aswell if you think that kind of thing is acceptable then your not thinking about this in the right way
 
Your right in that way. Children do have to put up with a load of nasty things inflicted upon them by the media, but how is this the straw that broke the camels back?
 
goth13girl666 said:
if you think that kind of thing is acceptable then your not thinking about this in the right way
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And there was me thinking this was a discussion board :shock:

Hopefully you're going to give all the reasoned arguments about why no view apart from your own can have merit?

Kath
 
Note: The following use of the word "you" is intended indirectly, in a more "everybody else" kind of way.

If everybody who sees these things day to day is fine with it; if no one is harmed by it, and the worst thing that happens is that they go on to teach other people to be fine with it, who cares what you think of it? And also, it's not just Eastern European tales that were fairly heavily themed. Western ones were just as bad until Victorian times when children started to be treated more patronisingly.

Don't get me wrong, kids should be kids. They should have fun and innocence and all the rest of that, but acting like scary tales or park equipment will destroy their lives and warp their minds is a little... dramatic, I think.
 
I spent many years away from TV sets, so I was a middle-aged man when I first saw Sesame Street - and I was horrified!

"They're showing this weird and evil-looking bunch of characters to kids?!" :shock:

(It was a far cry from Muffin the Mule or The Flowerpot Men, I suppose! 8) )
 
You know what scared me the most when I was little?
H R Pufnstuf. Without a doubt the most disturbing, horrifying thing I've ever seen.

Coneheads also scared me.

Meanwhile Dad would read Stephen King novels to me and I was fine with that. I was a bizarre child. I suppose my avatar supports that.
 
For me it was my grans sinisterly inscrutable brass buddha.

Ill find you a pic, hes not a happy buddha, just a grimly serene one.

bring back Roald dahl[/img]
 
my mother had a fox fur stole i used to be terrified of. It still had paws on and everything, she'd leave it draped over the dressing table mirror and i was convinced it's eyes were watching me around the room.
 
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