— FRESCOES —

Wonderland

¬ The 100 richest people in the world*

Triptych 5 x 2.5 m | 1.5 x 2.5 / 2 x 2.5 / 1.5 x 2.5 m | 2015
Printed in 5 copies on 5mm Dibond (direct to plate)
Tribute to Thierry Bouts and Jheronimus Bosch

The rich had ended up taking everything. Every drop of water, every grain of wheat, every breath of fresh air belonged to them. We, the toothless, had nothing left but our bodies, the last vestiges of an economy where flesh had become currency. The street was nothing more than a macabre marketplace. “Give me your kidney, I'll give you a piece of my calf,” a desperate father would shout to his neighbor, whose hollow cheeks betrayed his hunger. Others, consumed by love or madness, willingly offered their livers to their starving children. The smartest sold themselves piece by piece, maintaining a strange accounting of their limbs. The nightmares of Hieronymus Bosch had become our daily life. A devouring, literally cannibalistic humanity feasted on itself, at the very top of a pyramid of blood. The 'Bulls' of the temple maintained order and in their ivory tower, the 1% savored their triumph.

INTRODUCTION ‘The frescoes’ | JEAN-MARIE WYNANTS | Journalist | 2021 — The mural, for Lucas Racasse, is the magnum opus, the firework finale, the moment when all constraints blow apart. It’s where the artist lets loose, conjuring up encounters as improbable as they are exhilarating, crafting crowds made up entirely of familiar faces that viewers can spend hours identifying, one by one. While murals have often served to glorify the feats of our great men, the way Racasse seizes the genre throws out the rulebook entirely. Borrowing the faces of political, media, scientific, athletic, religious, philosophical, and musical figures, he assembles impossible gatherings that make us dream, hallucinate, laugh—or wince. In Wonderland, the planet’s 100 richest personalities roar with laughter as they’re hurled along runaway roller coasters shaped like golden calves, while the apocalypse rages all around. In Inferno, history’s most notorious murderers cheer wildly at a boxing match between Cain and Abel, refereed by none other than Adolf Hitler. The Blessed Bath takes dozens of gods, saints, preachers, and other religious icons on a dip in paradisiacal waters. And he pushes even further in Belgica Sexicæ Unita, taking the phrase “Belgian mess” quite literally by staging a gigantic orgy with all our political figures. Iconoclast, Racasse? No doubt about it. And he goes to great lengths to find, on each face, the perfect expression to match the role he assigns. But this contemporary Michelangelo doesn’t just revel in portraying the dark follies of the world. Sometimes he leaves Dante’s Inferno behind and leads us into Paradise. That’s how we get a spectacular gathering of hundreds of artists in a Parliamento we’d love to attend. Or a massive demonstration of global celebrities rallying behind the slogan “Free the Images.” Not to mention Midnight in Belgium, where all the country’s iconic figures gather around a fry stand in front of the Royal Palace. “Formidable!” laughs Stromae. “Surreal!” chuckles Magritte at the sight of a dancing fry and a Manneken Pis perched atop the Yellow Mark. And you can bet that in just a heartbeat, they’ll all be howling in chorus with Arno: “Damn, damn, it’s bloody great!” Excerpt from the book Every Day Is Picture Day, published in 2022.

CASTING *TOP 100 FORBES 2011 ◼︎ Carlos Slim Helu ■ Bill Gates ■ Warren Buffett ■ Bernard Arnault ■ Larry Ellison ■ Lakshmi Mittal ■ Amancio Ortega ■ Eike Batista ■ Mukesh Ambani ■ Christy Walton ■ Li Ka-Shing ■ Karl Albrecht ■ Stefan Persson ■ Vladimir Lisin ■ Liliane Bettencourt ■ Sheldon Adelson ■ David Thomson ■ Charles Koch ■ David Koch ■ Jim Walton ■ Alice Walton ■ S. Robson Walton ■ Thomas & Raymond Kwok ■ Larry Page ■ Sergey Brin ■ Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud ■ Iris Fontbona ■ Lee Shau Kee ■ Alexei Mordashov ■ Jeff Bezos ■ Michael Bloomberg ■ Michele Ferrero ■ Mikhail Prokhorov ■ Vladimir Potanin ■ Alisher Usmanov ■ Azim Premji ■ Oleg Deripaska ■ Michael Otto ■ German Larrea Mota Velasco ■ Rinat Akhmetov ■ John Paulson ■ Shashi & Ravi Ruia ■ Mikhail Fridman ■ Michael Dell ■ Susanne Klatten ■ Steve Ballmer ■ George Soros ■ Berthold & Theo Jr. Albrecht ■ Birgit Rausing ■ Vagit Alekperov ■ Aliko Dangote ■ Mark Zuckerberg ■ Anne Cox Chambers ■ Roman Abramovich ■ Jorge Paulo Lemann ■ Savitri Jindal ■ Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor ■ Paul Allen ■ Viktor Vekselberg ■ Phil Knight ■ Robert Kuok ■ Carl Icahn ■ Mohammed Al Amoudi ■ Donald Bren ■ Ronald Perelman ■ Alberto Bailleres Gonzalez ■ Francois Pinault ■ Joseph Safra ■ Abigail Johnson ■ Viktor Rashnikov ■ Leonardo Del Vecchio ■ John Fredriksen ■ Stefan Quandt ■ James Simons ■ Luis Carlos Sarmiento ■ Horst Paulmann ■ Bernardo Matte ■ Eliodoro Matte ■ Patricia Matte ■ Patricia Matte ■ Nasser Al-Kharafi ■ Sammy Ofer ■ Len Blavatnik ■ Gautam Adani ■ Hans Rausing ■ Ernesto Bertarelli ■ John Mars ■ Jacqueline Mars ■ Forrest Mars ■ Klaus-Michael Kuhne ■ Iskander Makhmudov ■ Johanna Quandt ■ George Kaiser ■ Maria-Elisabeth & Georg Schaeffler ■ German Khan ■ Ananda Krishnan ■ Dmitry Rybolovlev ■ Robin Li ■ Serge Dassault ■ Kumar Birlaand