When you always walk the same paths knowing every tree, every shifting shadow cast by the sun at any given hour, the flowers and stones along the roadside you have cleared away, and the familiar silence that accompanies your progress it is difficult to change direction and dare to venture a new route, perhaps even through a bramble hedge. Yet today, more than ever, art is synonymous with content.

Content is simultaneously provocation and a question mark; art now forges new, independent paths.Ways that have become increasingly difficult to comprehend. Pipilotti Rist once said: "Art is whatever sells."

But the chasm between these concepts has grown vast. For years, I have been searching for a strategic concept to bridge the gap between the economy and the arts much in the way a wedding ring is a work of craftsmanship, yet its accompanying vows constitute a universally recognized statement. When a goldsmith’s wedding ring is recognized as a work of art, it becomes seamlessly integrated into and accepted by the global sphere. This transformation moving from the specific context of the art world into the daily visibility of commerce serves as a safeguard for artists and their creations. For a long time, I sought that connecting link—that source of mutual added value. The answer lies in gaining attention through credit card designs. Everyone owns one; everyone wants one and so, the circle is complete.

WHY THE ART INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION?