STAY HYDRATED

The topic of water is important for the geostrategic position of every single country in the world. However, the operational issues of water are very often distributed to the lower levels of region, city, and community. The state water policies are very often coherent documents with clear strategies, but when they reach the local level, where they should be implemented, we encounter quite a complicated situation resulting in poor maintenance or privatization of key segments of water distribution without the private companies significantly giving back to the community. Through the issue of the profit from water, we confront the matter of water’s actual value– which is hard to express only through economic units like money or gold.

The Stay Hydrated. The Value of Water project was initiated by CCEA MOBA as an artistic interpretation of open source data, investigating how water is valued, governed, and accessed across global cities. Sourcing data from cities' own statistics and international organizations focusing on water policies, we compared prices of tap water in selected cities with their average prices of labour (average salaries) to determine the amount of work time needed to afford 1 cubic meter of tap water in each city. While in some regions the statistical data does not correspond with reality, we still regard these indicative figures as impressive.

The last subject we touch on is the emancipation of water, or to use the western world’s terminology: the democratization of water. We focus on showcasing the processes that can be developed by responsible authorities, as well as individuals. The aim is to understand water as a vital common resource that should not be private (or a commodity) and regarded as a perpetually renewable unlimited source.

We do not dare to offer simplistic opinions or solutions. But we believe that the Stay Hydrated. The Value of Water exhibition and booklet will highlight the topic of water for a universally valid debate on every level for every country, from the political representation to the smallest of communities.