Eyeing The Debt (2024)
Today, finance has a decisive influence on the articulation of the social order: it shapes the daily decisions of individuals in particular, has an impact on (the protection of) the environment and delimits the level of realization of debtor populations’ human rights. Such relevance of finance for life in community urges us to place it at the center of public debate and not leave it only in the hands of technicians, bureaucrats and economists.
We call, then, for a greater approach to the role of finance from the social sciences, while we vindicate the remarkable role that art can play in interpreting the centrality of debt today and understand that debt is not merely a technical mechanism with neutral effects, nor is it something immovable, unappealable, written in stone.
There is a fundamental political denunciation that drove the initial discussions of this photographic project, the design and adjustment of the sketches, the construction of the scenes, the shots and the post-production: the way finance works today -materialized, to a large extent, in debts- tends to strengthen the position of the powerful and the rich at the expense of the human rights of the most vulnerable sectors.
This collaborative project is the result of the work of Jairo Alvarez, photographer and mixed media artist based in Copenhagen, and Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky, researcher at the Argentina’s National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) and National University of Rio Negro. Their combined effort explores the intersection between finance, art, and human rights, seeking to illustrate the deep social impact.
Read more about this project
Save or go bust
Blood traction
Debt burden
Subsidy
Keep running
Red carpet
Traced paths
Overheat
Over low heat
House of cards
Let's eat!
Script
Universal protection
Holding futures
Your coat is mine
Financial health
Defendant
Mirror, mirror
16th of the month
Forced break
Fair Play
Non bail-out