We Could Own the Air was an experimental installation conceived of for the MAVis. (MA Visual Arts Practice at IADT Dun Laoghaire) Public Gesture exhibition in 2010; the title of the exhibition was Pirate Capital.
W.C.O.T.A. purposefully deviated from the artist's usual painting practice to investigate ideas of representation and to work with representational imagery in another medium apart from painting.
W.C.O.T.A. was conceived of as a performative mise-en-scene. Home-made "slogan" prints were dotted among familiar, pop-culture posters throughout the installation; these contained paradoxical statements about capitalism, containing such slogans as:
"We Must Promote Freedom at all Costs - The Price of this Promotion is the Measure of the Freedom we can Afford"
"We will bring democracy to those that suffer under totalitarianism. Democracy must prevail, except where it is threatened to be voted out of government."
"Neo-Liberalism promotes personal independence in an unmatched choice of effective relationships - a friend, after all, is a great asset."
A few elements - which might belong to the set of a Hollywood pirate-movie - were included in and among the other objects which went to make up the "scene"; these included: an envelope opener that resembled a Hollywood pirate's sword, a cushion that looked like it was brought from Marrakesh, a golden bowl and a statuette of a Chinese boy pulling a rickshaw.
.jpg)
