Vincenzo Fiore Marrese

Substitute

Abstract

Painters utilized minerals to craft colours, while the industry employed minerals in electronic device production.

Today, the mining of minerals is influential for technology. Yet the mining of these minerals raises relevant social problems.

In this artwork, I have combined coloured pigment and soil. The soil is part of a work by the artist Rachel Harris. I asked her to be part of a collaborative act.

The pigment is a chemical pigment designed to replace the mineral cobalt. On the product box, it says "substitute." That's where the title of the artwork comes from.

A transparent sphere protects the ground and the pigment. It is one-half of the earth and has an incomplete outlook on the world.

Indeed, cobalt is one of those minerals that is critical to the technology industry.