This piece of writing was written to surport the following works, please forgive me:
The evaluation of space part: 5b
‘National Lottery scratch cards’
Or:
"The nihilism and waste of post-modern gambling
produces such beautiful pieces of paper."
For the current past six months I have been collecting national lottery tickets that I’ve been finding on the floor. No, it’s not anything to do with Stephen Gills work that was published a couple of months ago in the Guardian, but because I saw something in them? In the past I have sold them when working in petrol stations and when walking back from work, seen then disregarded on the pavement. The metallic patch scraped away, or if your lucky, completely removed with the losing symbols exposed to moon light. Something about the marks on the paper or a subconscious need to look after them like WWI trench victims that were left to fend for them selves on sivey Street. All imperfect pieces of paper, just because they have been used as canon fodder, that are all thrown away when seen as what they really are: Failures. Not out of choice, but out of destiny. No one to blame and nothing could have foreseen it as they were pulled out the display stand. Perfect in everyway, protected from when they were first made buy security guards and Perspex boxes locked day and night. Except and until they were finally bought and owned. Then if they contained the right symbols under the thin layer of aluminium foil are keep or they are disregarded, then and there, as a waste of space. They do not have what it takes inside. No longer a solution out of an economic struggle that they have found them selves in, just a waste of time and paper.
Although, all these little piece of paper are all unique and special in there own little way. Just not in the right way as society sees. But all to beautiful and eye catch for some one to pick them up and admirer their aura for a second or longer.
I try not to seek them out; they find me (in a way). Sparkling on the ground with their metallic areas or a flash of a barcode. No going through bins, no asking people and no long walks around the streets of whatever town I happen to be visiting. Just going through life, finding the leftovers of others, as they try to live up to expectations of this poisonous modern age, the easy way. When I just pick at the remains.