The Last Slice

K48 Kontinuum, No Soul for Sale / Tate Modern, London

As an ubiquitous, and iconic symbol of New York City, pizza denotes the collaborative’s interests in cultural appropriation.

A slice of pizza is photographed from an aerial perspective to produce a black and white image that is expected to cover the entire floor space allotted to us in Turbine Hall. This image is then juxtaposed with a ‘real object’ by placing an empty pizza box with leftover crusts and greasy pizza box liner on top of the image. A black and white photograph of a slice of pizza bares references to forensic photography and mug shots, the Grotesque, and the Absurd. Between the empty pizza box and enormous size of the photograph of a slice of pizza, intriguing visual tension is anticipated at both ground level, and from the balconies of Turbine Hall.

The ancient Greeks and Romans invented pizza centuries ago. In the 20th Century pizza became an international food. In 1993, Pizza Hut, a popular American food franchise, introduced pizza to Pakistan and in 2009 sales generated over $2 billion annually, which is the second largest pizza sales revenue after the US. ‘The Last Slice’ is about current economics and trying to “make it” in New York and all corners of the globe.

In the 21st Century, reality is just another illusion. K48 Kontinuum’s project for No Soul For Sale, Tate Modern will appropriate this icon as a visual motif—recycling 20th Century ideas of Dada, Surrealism, Pop, and The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Delivering a subversive critique of Postmodern culture’s rampant consumption and depletion, dwindling natural resources, and over population. Sustenance, need, and convenience speaks loud from all corners of the globe as well as from our stomachs as we all fight for survival in the metropolises of our urban dystopias. The recognizable pop culture motif of a slice of pizza is a conceptual indicator for all these things and more.

One slice left of the whole. Our last slice will be a symbol of our concurrent economic global collapse—an illusion of our Post-modern dilemma. The empty pizza box is a signifier of depletion, and deflation, exhaustion, waste and void, but also, satisfaction, fullness, and wanting more. Metaphorically, it is about power struggles, choices and globalization. Rich people eat it, poor people eat it. It’s delicious and satisfying whether it’s a cheap dollar slice on St. Mark’s Place in NYC or from a chic gourmet restaurant. Pizza is an egalitarian cuisine. K48 is an egalitarian collaborative group.

NO SOUL FOR SALE