Public Trust by Paul Ramírez Jonas seeks to examine the value we grant to our words through the promises we make to each other and to ourselves.

At Public Trust the visitors can make a promise which will be recorded in a drawing that they can keep. This promise will be published on a large marquee placed in the museum’s plaza alongside the pledges made by politicians, scientists, economists and weather forecasters, which will be procured from the daily news headlines.

Paul Ramírez Jonas’ projects seek ways to incorporate both the intimacy of a “one-to-one” relationship to traditional works of art, and the “one-to-many” nature of public monuments. With Public Trust, he engages with the general public, regardless of the particular background of each participant, in shaping an artwork about the promises and acts of speech that keep a society together.