by Lennie Bellew

In the mid-1990’s a group of mock urban terrorists, calling themselves the Front de Libération des Nains de Jardin (FLNJ) or the Garden Gnome Liberation Front, initiated a wave of attacks in northern France aimed at kidnapping Gnomes from their captive gardens and freeing them back into their natural forest habitat. What seemed to have started as a prank soon had public outcry from newly gnome-less families bringing the problem to the police.

In the spring of '97, four members of the FLNJ were arrested in northern France after being caught with nearly 200 Gnomes. The men were fined, the Gnomes returned to captivity, and FLNJ seemed to have virtually disappeared -- only to resurface after a three-year hiatus. Then, after liberating dozens of the creatures in a late night raid on a Paris exhibition at the Bagatelle garden featuring the diminutive imps, the group once again slipped into obscurity.

Whatever your personal feelings for the seven male escorts of Snow White (Snehoulka) may be, there is no denying that these little creatures have permeated popular culture. Whether you see them as a cultural icon, a social statement, a kitschy object d’art or mythological creatures held against their will, like Madonna , they are either passionately loved or deeply hated. 

Those who love them have been known to pay as much as $100 each for the small statues and several million of the little guys are currently being held in Western European gardens. Other gnomes have slipped into urban folklore by taking world tours and returning to their surprised owners accompanied by photos of themselves in exotic destinations.Those that hate them see them as a national problem and think that they are just plain ugly. Tragically, in some cases this hatred has led to death. Kidnapped Gnomes have been returned to owners in pieces when ransom demands were not met, and more recently, in a last cry for help, eleven gnomes died for the cause hanging themselves from a bridge in eastern France.

National problem? Harmless prank? Justifiable homicide ? Or could it be that the clusters of liberated gnomes found grouped in forest settings, repainted and outfitted with sunglasses and pasta, are carriers of deeper meanings?  Ultimately, the truth is irrelevant, and in the meantime the battle will continue.

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