Man Does Not Live on Bread Alone #2, Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights engraved in household soaps, 81 x 253 x 4 cm. Production Marseille-Provence 2013, Ateliers de l’EuroMéditerranée.

Man Does not Live on Bread Alone reproduces Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as adopted on 10 December 1948 by the General Assembly of the United Nations at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, which mentions the freedom of all individuals to travel, to choose their place of residence and to leave or return to their country. First made in 2007, the installation consists of letters cast in Swiss chocolate, together reproducing the words in this short paragraph of universal law. Presented on a cooler‑table, the work is offered to visitors who, in eating it, make it disappear.

This second version of the work was made in 2012. Engraved in bars of Marseille soap, the article echoes both the history of that port city, a place of transit and of human circulation since time immemorial, and the French expression s’en laver les mains (to wash your hands of something). Via the evocative title and the use of friable, damageable materials, Batniji interrogates the notions of rights and of freedom, poetically underlining their fragility.