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Artist: Vegesent
Materials: Discarded top, sand, various pigments.
Dimensions: 60 × 35 cm 23 x 13 in
Concept:
The work investigates how economic logic shapes perception by determining which forms of life acquire value and which become surplus.
Built from a discarded 50-euro T-shirt, sand and pigments, the work asks what happens when a sentient life acquires a market value lower than the cost of keeping it alive.
Male chicks, dairy calves and buck kids are often killed soon after birth because they do not produce the commodities the production system is designed to sell. The cost of keeping these animals alive exceeds their market value, making slaughter the economically preferred outcome.
The T-shirt functions as a familiar measure of value. By placing a discarded consumer object alongside this economic mechanism, Negative Value translates an abstract production system into material form.
Research based on: Bolton & von Keyserlingk (2021); Trends and Factors Associated with Dairy Calf Early Slaughter in Ireland (2023); Animal Welfare Act (693/2023, Finland); Council Regulation (EC) No 1099/2009.
Artist: Vegesent
Materials: Discarded top, sand, various pigments.
Dimensions: 60 × 35 cm 23 x 13 in
Concept:
The work investigates how economic logic shapes perception by determining which forms of life acquire value and which become surplus.
Built from a discarded 50-euro T-shirt, sand and pigments, the work asks what happens when a sentient life acquires a market value lower than the cost of keeping it alive.
Male chicks, dairy calves and buck kids are often killed soon after birth because they do not produce the commodities the production system is designed to sell. The cost of keeping these animals alive exceeds their market value, making slaughter the economically preferred outcome.
The T-shirt functions as a familiar measure of value. By placing a discarded consumer object alongside this economic mechanism, Negative Value translates an abstract production system into material form.
Research based on: Bolton & von Keyserlingk (2021); Trends and Factors Associated with Dairy Calf Early Slaughter in Ireland (2023); Animal Welfare Act (693/2023, Finland); Council Regulation (EC) No 1099/2009.
