I went to a talk over at the Bard Graduate Center on ritual objects. There was an 18 minute documentary on what I would call object veneration or transference or a transitional object – I dont really know… It is the manifestation of a desire in a physical object.
I, personally, do not have reverence for objects and I feel like this is a personal shortcoming. I feel like my work in manufacturing has disenchanted objects for me. But this is really not what this is about. It is about the uniqueness of an object but about making an object unique through some sort of personal identification or transformation – through desire. Perhaps there is something wrong with my desiring mechanisms, that I do not have ritual objects…
In any case, one of the objects that are imbued with desire is the Ekeko. Ekeko seems more like a god, or spirit, but it is an object brought to life by the desire for what the Ekeko symbolizes – abundance and material wealth (for example).
Recently, the Ekeka has been introduced. This is the female verso of the Ekeko. I imagine a factory in china making Ekekas, similar to the one that probably makes Ekeko, probably out of poly resin. Does this make the Ekeka more or less valuable or precious. It is, for me, the intersection of the capitalist economy with the gift economy that perhaps make me the most uneasy.