A second-hand belt is presented on a modest platform. Attached to its fastening pin is a transparent epoxy sphere filled with decorative elements that echo the sparkling stones embedded in the buckle. Although the addition appears to enhance the object aesthetically, it renders the belt unusable: the pin can no longer pass through the belt holes. Next to the belt, three larger epoxy spheres are displayed inside an oversized transparent display case. They contain the same material as the attached sphere but increase progressively in size. While these spheres have no practical function without the belt, they are presented as the most valuable elements of the installation.
The work examines the shift from use value to sign value. In contemporary consumer culture, objects are increasingly valued less for their practical function than for the symbolic meanings they communicate. Accessories, ornaments and luxury markers no longer merely express an object's identity; they become its primary source of value.
This inversion refers to Jean Baudrillard's analysis of the sign economy. Objects circulate not simply as useful things but as signs within a system of symbolic and social differentiation. Here, the belt is reduced to a support for its accessories, while the accessories—despite depending entirely on the original object—acquire the highest symbolic status. The display case does not merely protect what is valuable; it actively produces value. The Supremacy of Signs materializes a Baudrillardian inversion in which the sign eclipses the object and representation becomes more important than function.