TOGHETHER TOWARDS THE FUTURE 2011
Participatory Installation
PVC Carpet, glass, stack of art-reviews, stools,
Bottles of mineral water
"Interventi" Museo Visconteo Locarno, 2011
Credit:© Patricia Jacomella Bonola
QUARANTINE 2008
Installation & Performance
Black Tarpaulin, nose-mouth mask
"Peste" Bluvanoni – Space for Contemporary Art Losone,2008
During the exhibition the Space for Contemporary Art Bluvanoni had been put under quarantine. The building was isolated and covered by a big black tarpaulin so that twelve selected artists were able to work in an uncontaminated environment and found the answers for the future of society, culture and art. To avoid contamination during the exhibition the visitor was invited to put on a nose-mouth mask, which was distributed freely outside the building.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
SMOKING 2008
Installation
Mattress, 6 stools with High visibility fabric, reflective ribbons
"La pittura e l'Oltre" Pinacoteca Casa Rusca Locarno
The report of the Centers for Disease Control indicates that tobacco consumption is closely linked to the workplace and also in relation to the type of trade carried out. The major tobacco consumers are the bricklayers and employees of the building and catering industry.
Paradoxically, the word "smoking" also refers to a type of gala suit to wear only in the evening, born in the English high society and worn by men in smoking rooms (forbidden to women) in order to preserve the dress from smell of tobacco.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
DIPLOMA HONORIS CAUSA 2007
Performance & Initiation Ceremony
Friday, 23.11.2007, 20-22
Cabaret Voltaire Zürich
During Documenta 12 we designed a framework project. Anyone interested has the opportunity to receive an award from J&W in Art Vivendi. The diploma "Honoris Causa" was presented as part of a celebration at the Cabaret Voltaire. Postcards with registration voucher were available for free in Kassel during the opening of the Documenta.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
THE CONVERTIBLE ENTRANCE TICKET 2006
Performance
Sunday, 9. April 2006, 14-20
"Il museo insostenibile" La Rada Locarno, Space for Contemporary Art
The visitor pays the entry with a ten-franc note, which is stamped by J&W and used by the visitor as an entry ticket.
The "ticket" is canceled as usual by tearing it and then returned to the visitor.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
100 : 100 = 100
Installtion
Numbers, two videos, hat
"Dalla pagina allo Spazio" Museo Cantonale d’Arte Lugano, 2005
The idea behind this work, however, is to prompt a more general reflection on the mechanics of distributing the wealth of our society. The error, form the logical-mathematical linguistic point of view which characterizes the expression, 100 : 100 = 100, visualized on a wall of the room, allows us to immediately perceive an elementary concept which, in its correct formulation (100 : 100 = 1), ends up in the background. If the correct calculation stresses the fact that the amount of an asset is proportionally reduced by the number of people sharing it, the formula which the artist propose by overturning this point of view, reminds us that the more an asset is subdivided, the more people can benefit from it.
Credit: © Stefania Beretta
DIE ERDE, EIN GEBURTSRECHT 2004
Installation
Soil, plate, shield
"Zentralschweizer Kunstschaffen" Kunstmuseum Luzern, 2004
In the course of capitalization, during which money and power, profit, speculation, and corruption have often been equated with justice, progress, culture, and religion, the earth seems to have become a mere commodity.
In Ecuador, a major landslide occurred 20 years ago, consequence of which a man found a piece of gold attracting hordes of hopeful seekers. Today Bela Rica is home to 7,000 people in miserable barracks where women, men and children from the age of four onwards work hard from dawn to dusk, hoping to find gold. We stand in the art museum on a ground with a nominal value of approx. CHF 1'400. - per mq. With the sale of 7 mq of this land in Bela Rica you can acquire a plot of land of 10'000 mq, on which it is possible to grow a whole paddy field.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella
THE CONTRACT 2004
Installation
Photographs on PVC, Glass showcase with 8 Contracts
"Dalla pagina allo spazio" Museo Cantonale d’Arte Lugano, 2004
The project, made especially for the Museo Cantonale d’Arte, is intended, in the first place, to create a brief but concrete chance for work for some of the numerous Ecuadorian immigrants living in Ticino.
To eight of these people, who often meet in front of supermarkets to play their traditional national music for a few coins, the J&W offered a contract to work together to produce the photographs and videos on exhibition here.
Credit: © Stefania Beretta
THE WONDERSHOP 2003
Installation & Performance
100 parcels, advertising material
"Che c'è di nuovo? La scena artistica emergente in Ticino" Museo Cantonale d’Arte Lugano
Within the market of art, J&W always proposes new strategies. The Wonder Shop is a performance shown at the Cantonal Art Museum in Lugano, where one hundred parcels can be bought, each of which contains a different handmade object of a different value. The wrapping, made by J&W’s artists gives a considerable added value to the parcels.The buyer can choose to: open the parcel and find a useful object inside, which has little value, or keep the mysterious object wrapped in its precious packaging and thus own an ephemeral object which has a high added value. In the first case we will have lost the immaterial value in favour of a real material value, in the second we will have a flimsy parcel but with a high added value.Therefore we can assert that the wrapping determines the value of the object.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella
KAUFEN SIE NEUE WERTE 2003
Installation & Performance
250 Registered Shares
Kunsthalle Luzern
Why not buy an intangible work of art and participate in a multicultural project?We have been working to advance a new, intercultural form of trade and investment since 1991. Art and the “production of a work” are not equated here, for in this new context artistic quality becomes dependent on the quality of communication. J&W is preparing to bring about a shift in the present hierarchy of values. With this in mind, we have issued “shares”, printed on handmade paper produced by a cooperative in Nepal and supported by Helvetas. These shares are a first-rate investment for a change. The benefits are not judged in terms of money, where speculation can be disappointing in more ways. Here, improved quality of life is the real gain.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
PERFORMANCE IM BOX 1995
Shedhalle Zürich
We have found that culture is only possible where capital exists. How is it possible to have a fair cultural exchange with developing countries under these circumstances? First, capital must be democratized, and subsequently the work of developing countries be recognized as a complementary and equal cultural bearer.
The J & W wants to create the appropriate framework to promote an exchange between cultures so that a global-parity and pluralistic cultural exchange between north and south can be made possible.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
ONE WAY MONEY 2001
Performance
14.9. - 15.9.2001, 8 P.M.
Tirana Biennale 1
Institute of Contemporary Art Tirana, Albania
During the opening of the Tirana Biennial 1, J&W handed out printed banknotes with the text "One Way Money" and the crossed-out recycling symbol to prevent further use of the banknote. J&W wants to focus its attention on the power of money and its consequences, so that in society a new sensitivity of values can occur. Money should not be a commodity, but be democratic to serve the self-realization of all.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
CULTURAL EXCHANGE 1993
Installation
Montserrat Gallery New York
J&W demonstratively place their art in the service of a political and social cause. On the one hand, J&W want to turn a concrete financial profit and - in the spirit of release - translate art-market earnings into “genuine values”, namely intercultural production and communication. But beyond that, they prompt reflection on the functions of money and the value we attribute to it. Works of art are considered worthwhile investments, Third World crafts are not. The former are allowed to carry a high price-tag, the latter are expected to be as cheap as possible.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola
J&W CHANGE OFFICE 1995
Performance 21. – 24. September 1995
Performance Index
Warteck pp, Basel
By buying African currency, you support this project. The surplus will be invested by J&W in the NESA (Nouvelles Editions Africaines du Sénégal) so that one can give the many silent voices, not one, but many voices.
Credit: © Patricia Jacomella Bonola