Inside a hybrid ballot box-cash machine, dozens of voting slips from the recent Greek referendum, each meticulously marked oxi, were visible behind a clear panel. And, for every oxi – or no – vote deposited, drachmas were dispensed, spilling onto the streets of Madrid.
As revelations of a secret contingency plan to return to the drachma surfaced during talks between Greece and its creditors, Spanish art collective Luzinterruptus had been busy working on the art installation that lasted perhaps eight hours.
“We, at a distance, were so elated at the landslide of the oxi in the referendum,” the collective said. “We saw this not just as a way of consolidating popular sovereignty, but also as a tiny chink through which the long-awaited change would finally sneak into Spain.”
Previous installations by the collective have tackled issues ranging from Spain’s gag law to the erosion of its public healthcare system.
Their latest work was meant as a tribute to the Greek people. “We wanted to celebrate the chance that cash machines in Greece could have their very own currency flowing out of them, a currency that would lie outside the malign influence of the Eurogroup.”
The drachma installation was set up in mid-July, just as the EU agreed a multi-billion euro bridging loan for Greece. Luzinterruptus estimated it survived eight hours before being dismantled by the banks.
Many in Spain have been watching the situation in Greece closely, seeing it as a proxy struggle of the political battle playing out in Madrid, where a general election is due by the end of the year.
Pablo Iglesias, whose anti-austerity party Podemos has vowed to do away with the austerity measures that have marked southern Europe’s relationship with the EU, has called the Greek situation a “historical crossroads in Europe” and described it as a choice between democracy or barbarism.
Spain’s governing People’s party, meanwhile, has used the situation in Greece to insist that austerity and economic reforms – like those carried out in Spain – are the only possible choice for Greece.
