design/research/currency
2002–2006 — OCAD (Toronto)
2008–2010 — Sandberg Institute (Amsterdam)
Clients/Partners
C Magazine
Scapegoat Magazine
The Walrus Magazine
Toronto Life Magazine
Casco - Office for Art, Design and Theory
Dutch Art Institute/MFA ArtEZ
Justina M. Barnicke Gallery
Helen Reed
Katie Bethune-Leaman
Tejpal Ajji
Maiko Tanaka
Christopher Regimbal
Amy Wallace
Gendai Gallery
Red Bull 381 Project Space
Toronto Free Gallery
Open Engagement
InCubate
Metahaven
Van Abbe Museum
Time/bank
Journal of Aesthetics and Protest
Designer — C Magazine
Designer and editorial board — Scapegoat: Landscape, Architecture, Political Economy
Currency Statement
My research and political interests lie directly with the issue of currency. I have done workshops where participants are tasked with devising an exchange system. The idea is to get a 'feeling' for the power dynamics implicit to such a task, and to articulate it in discussion without the need for expert jargon. I would like to do more of these. I am also interested in thinking about how to mobilize new forms of money (and even new ways of counting) as an exercise of power and agency by measuring values inimical to the hegemonic measures of value (i.e. fiat currencies). I believe that alternative currencies, even as speculative proposals, can also play a critical role by challenging notions of legitimacy and probing structural (discursive) coercion. Following an argument made by the "Central Bank of the United Transnational Republics"—that the classical separation of democratic power (executive, legislative, judicial) should be expanded to include money—I wonder if thinking through currency opens up the possibility of collapsing the spectrum of concerns between design and governance towards actualizing design's transformative capacities.
Exodus trade note: Exchangeable for 4 EUR at HEMA for
30 days from date of issue. The backing commodity is
a bucket of 100 colour markers. An experimental tool for
amplifying the circulation of value, temporarily.
fig. 4 military-coinage-complex: state and market
the sovereign issues payment to soldiers in a form that
emerge as two sides of the same coin
can retain its value over distance and time (i.e. gold).
the sovereign subsequently demands the same form of
payment through taxation (enforced by the soldiers), from
the population under its domain, thereby systematically
incentivizing the service of soldiers and the consequent
emergence of markets.
