thank you, 1994
Video installation, Capp Street Project, San Francisco. Curated by Mary Ceruti.
The space has been transformed into a coffee bar and an exhibition space with free coffee for the visitors.
Coffee cups with the inscription you pay but you don’t agree with the price were at disposition not only in the art space, but also handed out to coffee shops in the neighborhood (only one cofee bar said no thanks to this logistic support, as it had just raised its prices). Cups: take-away cups, 12 cm high, Ø 8 cm each.
How rich are you? is the question which RELAX asked some members of the board of Capp Street Project. Leaving the interviewed person direct the discussion, talking on politics, culture and personal matters.
Elements of the installation: the bar, 7 meters long (metal construction, wooden panel, glass) with a drawing under the glass (participants’ signatures), thousands of paper cups, a coffee machine, coffee, sugar, milk, paper towels.
A wooden partition with 14 photo-portraits and piggy banks. Loudspeakers gave back the interviewed with the participants (duration of the soundtrack: 2h30mn).
Each participant has chosen the dimensions of the photograph, has paid the production costs and has received the photo after the show.
Behind the How rich are you?-panel: thank you, a video projection and some used coffee cups on the floor.
Other elements on display: the donation pots, 7 glass jars, each about 40 cm high, labelled with a word: lend, save, take, share, borrow, give, checks only. The last jar was labelled with a parking bill ticket, charged by the police (275 $).
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