Gustavo Romano

If you had an extra minute, an extra hour, or an extra year in your life, how would you spend it? In this installation, Gustavo Romano uses »time« as currency, instead of money. The importance of money in the Theory of Arts is ambivalent. Certainly, money is, perhaps more so than the art, an emblematic system, which brings about an association of the desire and the material things. Gustavo Romano has developed a new currency-system, which represents a symbolic economy. It is not counted in Dollars, Euros, Pesos or Yen, but in minutes, hours, and years. In Romano’s Economics, »one’s lifetime« is the only relevant measure.

The »Time Notes project« comprises a series of actions carried out in public spaces (Singapore, Rostock, Vigo, Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Munich, Silicon Valley, Madrid, Washington, Berlin, Mumbai).

In the Buy and Sell Time Office an »employee« of Time Notes Bank asks the passing person about their most valuable day or year, or a minute that has changed their lives, and »buys« it with a correspondent bill in return. Selling time consists in asking them what would they do with an extra year, minute or day in their lives, and offering a bill with their wish printed in it. If they do not have a clear idea in their minds, the office can also offer bills of time that has been already bought from another person. As a result, the office will collect and spread bills with the most valuable moments (real and imaginary) of our »clients«.

Information

Website Gustavo Romano
Projectwebsite Time Notes

Biography

Gustavo Romano (*1958 Buenos Aires, Argentina) lives and works in Madrid, Spain.