betting slips, 2015.
one million thirty six thousand seven hundred and ninety three euros
the stack of betting slips that was thrown out, in front of a sport bookmaker in my neighbourhood in Montenegro. I guess these were copies that bookmakers should keep for taxes justification, so I took them curiously and made an overview of invested amount of money for one month. after I calculated the specific maximum winning from all the tickets (1036793 euros) I decided to treat the paper as a surface, thinking about characteristics of the material: a receipt is printed on a thermal paper, so I exposed each of them to a heat source that coloured the paper and erased (partially) the information. doing it one by one, fantasising how the paper of those tickets carries a story of a player where gambling is significant part of their lifestyles. by doing so, I performed my faith in the process, taking time through the devotion, getting tired through the repetition.
here the story of an artist and the story of a gambler can be compared. it is about the acceptance of risk and perception of a chance in constant investment. the belief that series of random events tends to self-correct through risk is often connected with fatigue. from the moment you start it is already late to stop. 1036793 reflects the tension between desire, gain and loss in the ever-unpredictable game of life.
exposed as a stack of betting slips of erased information they became a monument for a hope in anxiety, a daily routine and a lifestyle specific to certain socio-political moment in Montenegro.
