"Rooting, hogging or… dying.", by Erik Pevernagie, oil on canvas, 100 x 130cm

If we want to earn our living, we have to suffer. Many like to suffer, and for some, suffering can be a kind of artistic expression that challenges people and defies them with their limits, and, so, pain can be a shot to recognize the architecture and the workings of their being.

Working means suffering: this was the traditional way of thinking and living in our grandparents’ society. Labour ethics may have changed by now since too much suffering can be compensated through unemployment benefits.

In many countries in the world, the struggle for one dollar a day is still a bitter reality, though. "No gain without pain."

"Work makes you free" (“Arbeit macht frei ") is the title of a book of the 19 th century, making a plea for work as a means to combat boredom, gambling, and swindling. It can set them free from their own weakness and dependence. It regulates life and provides the necessary rhythmical pace to move on in life. The Nazis used the title as a slogan at the entrance of their concentration camps.

The French singer Henri Salvador has another interpretation: "Work is good for you" ( "Le travail, c’est la santé." ). But he adds frolic: "Doing nothing, makes you keep it" ( Ne rien faire, c'est la préserver ).

All this opens the door to "laziness". Paul Lafargue makes a plea for laziness with his book "Le Droit à la paresse" and reduces the "values" of labor completely.

Phenomenon: Work and laziness

Factual starting point: Man hogging