First presented in 2013, Cultured depicts a familiar Yakult cultured drink accompanied by the phrase: “More cultured than you will ever be!” The work adopts the visual language of popular culture and mass production to examine the systems through which art and culture acquire value.

The Yakult bottle is an intentionally accessible image: a mass-produced consumer product recognised through repetition, branding and widespread consumption. Placed within the context of an art fair, this familiarity is set against the perceived uniqueness and cultural status assigned to the art object. Its presentation at the Affordable Art Fair, alongside its graphic treatment and repetition, recalls the visual language of Pop Art and its engagement with mass-produced imagery and consumer culture.

The phrase “More cultured than you will ever be!” operates across several meanings. “Culture” refers simultaneously to the biological culture contained within the drink, ideas of refinement and sophistication, and the cultural value assigned to objects and individuals. The statement therefore turns a familiar commodity into a measure of cultural status.

By placing an ordinary consumer product within the context of the art market, Cultured questions the distinction between popular culture and high culture, commodity and artwork, and cultural value and financial value. It asks whether an object becomes “cultured” through what it is, how it is presented, or simply through the systems that determine how it should be valued.