The Way Earthly Things Are Going

Details

The Way Earthly Things Are Going is an immersive installation that links the volatility of global financial markets with the human experience of migration, precarity, and endurance. First created for documenta 14 in Athens (2017), the work juxtaposes live stock-market data with an ancient Greek lament, opening a stark dialogue between the abstractions of capitalism and the realities of human suffering.

At the centre of the installation, an LED ticker streams real-time, unaltered data from stock exchanges around the world. This relentless flow of numbers is slowed to align with the rhythm of the accompanying song, “Αλησμονώ και χαίρομαι (When I Forget, I’m Glad),” performed by the polyphonic ensemble Pleiades Vocal Group. The lament recounts a mother’s forced migration and her struggle to protect her children—an ancient story that resonates uncannily with today’s crises of displacement, conflict, and economic instability.

The title, borrowed from Bob Marley’s line “So much trouble in the world,” underscores the interconnected nature of global turbulence—from Greece’s economic collapse to the wider, ongoing challenges of inequality and migration.

By placing financial data and ancestral song side by side, The Way Earthly Things Are Going transforms the exhibition space into a site of reflection. It invites viewers to consider how the mechanisms of global finance shape human destinies, revealing a world where instability is shared, and resilience becomes a universal act of survival.

Info

• Title : The Way Earthly Things Are Going

• Year : 2017

• Medium : Multi-Channel audio, LED Display, Real-time Stock Exchange data.

• Duration : Variable.