I C A R C H 

A HOUSE FOR A PRINCE AND A PAUPER

 

 

This year the US Census found out that the gap between the rich and the poor is the highest ever, in the United States.

 

The Darwinian principle at work, at its worst, or at its best, as Darwin would have it.

 

How is it…???

 

At its best, or at its works…?????

 

Should we oppose to Darwin Lao Tzu…? Or Christ, or Buddha…????? Or Schopenhauer or Count Tolstoy…!!!

 

Says Schopenhauer:

 

This, obviously, both Darwin and Adams forgot, or never knew.

 

As they most certainly didn’t know, or chose to forget, what Lao Tzu said: the weak will overcome the strong.

 

In common language, the last will be the first.

 

As to the relativity of their positions, Shakespeare himself was acutely aware, in Hamlet: the beggar eats the fish that ate the king.

 

Beautiful the replacement of a king, in old Japan, with a thief, certainly a “smaller criminal” than the king himself, who committed many “legal” crimes, in the great movie by Kurosawa.

 

Equally great is the overlapping of the two in that novel “The Prince and the Pauper,” by Mark Twain, enjoyed by many uncorrupted (as yet) souls all over the world.

 

This, the very country that gave birth to Mark Twain forgot.

 

The ideology of the “strong” and rich, in the US, was and is, the prevailing religion. The green banknote dictated and dictates everything. But for how long…???????? For how long the ideology of fierce, Darwinian competition can create these huge discrepancies…? Of course, Capitalism is clever enough to know how to attempt to wash its sins. It invented “charity,” which in essence is an insult. Thus, charities of all kinds try to fool us. The billionaire, especially when he approaches old age, and the time of the “last judgment” arrives, choose to give away, highly publicized, a percentage of his wealth, obtained who knows how…!?!

 

Thus, Capitalism tries to wash some its dirt. And it seems it works. The poor rejoice, and everybody forgets that essentially it is impossible to amass billions through genuinely honest means.

 

So we ask you to explore the relationship between the “prince” and the pauper, between RICHNESS and POEVRTY, in the context of the HIGH CAPITALISM of today.

 

We do not have the illusion that we could eradicate the problems of the world though our effort. But we do hope that if we consciously address them, through our own work, perhaps something does happen.

 

Please send us ANY work, ANY size and ANY format to projects@icarch.us. We will publish all the works received on our new website, www.icarch.us. There is no registration fee. The deadline to submit your work is December 31st, 2010. If you have any questions please be kind and let us know.

 

Thank you,

 

ICARCH Gallery