Actualization
Exhibition.
Porcelain, archival inkjet pigment prints, paper, currency, dirt.
2018.

Accumulation and Actualization are complementary installations investigating the concept of money. 

Beginning in February 2007, the economy of Zimbabwe suffered from hyperinflation which triggered the printing of larger and larger denominations of bills. Eventually the currency became so devalued that paper notes like the absurd 5 billion dollar bill became useless for purchase - worth little more than the paper they were printed on, until the entire economy and national currency system collapsed. In an investigation of the materiality of currency and the cultural beliefs that uphold its otherwise fictitious valuation systems, I engaged in the typically deflationary practice of burning money (by encasing former legal tender in porcelain), as well as receipts, toilet paper, and other scraps of paper. The result is an exploration of: the process of degradation of a material that is arguably of the highest cultural significance, the meanings that evolve from this degradation, and how the artistic investigation is both reflective of and reactionary to history while revealing the fragility of the current dominant economic value system.