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Søren Wellings
small town museum
by Gitte Villesen
This work is made
up of two plates: one with images, and one with text documenting
Søren Wellings Small Town Museum and my visit there. The
image plate is reprinted here in the catalogue. The text plate is
a collection of scanned texts, a brochure I was given by Søren
Welling, a map of the Small Town Museum, and a short description
of my visit there (see above). All the texts, including Sørens
own, are translated to English. (caption under picture from History
Of The Museum) Excerpt of Søren Wellings brochure. One of
the brochures contained two texts. One with the title A Visit To
The Real Bank, the other Blunder Or Just A Slip Of The Pen?! In
the first, Søren describes how he had paid a visit to the
bank in order to hold the bank system to their promises, and to
criticize the way in which they account interest increases. In the
other, he explains why the interest system, according to him, is
the root of all crisis, bankruptcy and unemployment.
a visit to the “real bank”
by Søren Welling
I went in to the bank. “How can I help you?” asked the
friendly lady. I asked, carefully, if the bank was a real bank,
one that one could trust, especially with money matters. The lady
assured me that all went as it should there, and that I could be
comfortable putting my trust in the fact that everything the bank
promised would be delivered. A certain tree I asked politely for
permission to see with my own eyes if that which was written in
the window was true: This is where money grows. “Is there some
special green house here? Or maybe a certain tree?” Short pause.
“You earn interest on your money. It isn’t new money you
earn, it’s old money that’s used again and called interest.”
“May I see some proof?” Then she became irritable and
called her manager in. “Well,” he said, “it’s
actually something which we write down.” “Does this ‘accumulated
interest’
get written down in the same way as with regular accounting, and
accounts for the tax ministry? Are all the receipts present and
accounted for?” Just think, he didn’t know. I said to
him that it didn’t really matter, as there must be an accountant
there, it is of course his responsibility to monitor their liquid
assets and keep an eye on the receipts and make sure that they were
present and accounted for. No receipts The accountant was a sweet
woman. When I asked her for a receipt for the accumulated interest,
she became first sullen for a long time. The she turned red, and
finally admitted that she had never even thought about such a thing
before. And in fact, she had never seen a receipt for accumulated
interest. Interest was just a number which appeared there, and was,
by reflex, just accepted without further ado. It was there that
it occurred to me that the banks’ and all other peoples’
lack of money happens as a result of haphazard book keeping and
failed accounting. Therefore my proposal for the changing of an
untenable situation.
Originally published
in: Wiener Secession Catalogue, Gitte Villesen, 1999, ISBN 3-901926-08-9
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