CAFE OF EQUIVALENT$

Playing around with the the concoction, fabrication of value in the global capitalist financial system, we engaged city workers with some simple truth derivatives during their lunchbreak, equating their salaried/bonus income with the cost of lunch for a worker in the producing countries ie Mozambique, Brazil, Indonesia, Bangladesh.

The Cafe of Equivalent$, a lunch food stall selling food at cost equivocal to food affordability in the producing countries – the research to tailor the pricing for the project is not complete but – soup and bread in Mozambique for a worker earning $2 a day costs 20 cents , 10%daily wage – applied to the average bonus-earning-banker soup and bread from our stall costs $181.67, £111.20

This intervention is an attempt to create a transparency in an opaque world of money, making material the physical possibilities of using financial resources for need rather than profit.

Clients at the stall are invited to write their aspirations for a different future across the artwork.

Cafe of Equivalent$ was commissioned by LII for C.R.A.S.H. A Post Capitalist A-Z as part of 2 Degrees festival hosted by Arts Admin, June 2009. We setup in Leadenhall Market at the back of the Lloyd’s building in the heart of the City.