How many horses does it take to change the world? subverts, through a playful language, symbols related to the idea of power. Composed of two panels of drawings facing each other, the installation forms a passage space. Framed in a checkered pattern, a juxtaposition of antagonistic situations is divided into "houses" of opposite colors — a metaphorical perspective that harks back to the way in which, both in life and in board games, luck or misfortune can be cast by the randomness of a roll of the dice.

In dialoge with Western iconography, the image of the horse and its pedestal formulates a satire on the structures that socially and ideologically organize contemporary life (work, prison, school, etc). Traditionally related to naratives of domination, heroism, authority, and strength, the represented horses emerge freed from such connotations. They are figures that possess an almost human condition by performing a set of activities that in contemporary reality belongs either to the privileged sphere of leisure or to the underprivileged one of misfortunes.

By dancing while playing tambourine, bathing in flowing fountains, and imitating ghosts as children do with sheets, the horses portrayed in the white houses contrast with those that inhabit the black houses, facing rough seas, sinking in ships, and suffering in dark futures. Pointing to the absurdity of existence and the orders that condition it, to the game as a space for social critique, and to the fragility of an increasingly polarized and fragmented present, the work proposes a critical reflection.

In reference to the ubiquitous joke setup, How many horses does it take to change the world? encompasses the representation of contrasting mundane situations to question the idea of individual and collective freedom, to remind of the imminent threat of violence hanging over contemporary societies, and to challenge the arbitrariness that permeates human existence.

The work was commissioned for the 5th edition of Anozero - Coimbra Biennial, The Phantom of Liberty, curated by Ángel Calvo Ulloa and Marta Mestre, with the support of Mondriaan Fonds.