#233 Paper Cups - Lebanon

The number of imprints refer to the protests in Lebanon in 2019. The monthly charge for using WhatsApp for 6$ ignited protests which unleashed a surge of discontent in the country. They work is about the cost of living and neoliberal policies. Our dependence on material circumstances is our most basic condition, and the struggle for a fair distribution of economic resources might be the one with most subversive potential.

Paper Cups a series of paintings with imprints from regular paper cups. The kind you get from fast food places, and the kind that often is used by people begging in the streets. The series is about the disparity of economic resources.

Begging, an expression of the most precarious vulnerability is man’s most profound condition. We need others to exist. It is a gesture that expresses the truth about our position. Entirely subject to a potentially indifferent world. Begging tells something about money. We have an economic relationship with reality. We are endlessly exposed to the contingency of life, and to those who embrace the raw power of injustice. Begging, and giving without compensation and conditions, is a subversive act. A protest and an act of resistance, showing that another world is possible.