Hallie McNeill
Le p'tit bonheur espresso cups, 2016
Custom printed ceramic espresso cup with saucer / Edition of 25
2oz cup (approx. 2.25 x 2.5 x 1.6 inches)
 
Each $22 set comes with 1 cup and 1 saucer.
 
The star motif originated from a sculpture I made to think through some ideas about kitsch and taste, and then it became more about showing emotion in this weird kitsch way (happy vs. sad face), and then, with these cups, I was interested in how it could be even more elastic and used like an actual corporate logo. 
The phrase "le p’tit bonheur" comes from a 60's pop song by Félix Leclerc in which the singer, while strolling along, encounters "a little happiness" (literally - that's what "le p'tit bonheur" or "le petit bonheur" means) and picks it up to take along with him. The two have a good run together and then happiness leaves him, and he's left to his melancholic ways. 
I was interested in this way of looking at the natural ebb and flow to emotions, specifically, putting it to an actual narrative, moreover, one in which happiness is a character, rather than a kind of external factor, like an emotion or an environment.  And I was also interested in thinking about how the narrative arc of the song kind of mirrors the stereotypical cycle of consumption: obtain, consume, exhaust, and the idea of happiness as a kind of abstract being, not unlike a corporation being given the same rights as a person. 
-Hallie McNeill 2020