Variable Capital: Art and consumer Culture

Artists' fascination with pop culture and commodity aesthetics has led to the development of some of the most significant and popular art of the last fifty years. Yet while much of this art has concerned itself with the celebration of commodities as objects of desire, relatively little attention has been given to the human cost underpinning such cultures of excess. Variable Capital counters this trend and examines the way in which contemporary artists have critically responded to the seductive allure of globalised commodity consumption.