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Unscratched Lottery Cards: I Love My Life The Way It Is

Israeli lottery cards.

Eight years ago Ali Alvarez of the UK committed a willful act of defiant anticapitalism--she did not scratch a scratch-off lottery card. And she’s been not scratching ever since.

In her own words ...
There's something about the whole lottery thing that doesn't feel right to me - getting your hopes high, dreaming, escaping, and then usually being let down.

This happens to me on a daily basis WITHOUT the lottery's help, muchas gracias. So as an experiment, I started buying scratch cards and not scratching them.

It felt funny.

Then I showed it to a few people. It made them feel funny.

It made me think... "I think I'm onto something here."

I couldn't agree more. Such a simple concept—she doesn’t even do anything—and yet, so subversive.

Ali hopes to amass 8,000 tickets—enough to fill a 12 x12 foot space, floor to ceiling, as an art installation. Folks have been sending her scratch-off lottery cards from all over the world, and wouldn't you know, cheesy lottery design is, for the most part, universal. There are a few standouts, however, that have a bit of regional differentiation …


Lithuania


Australia


New York


Canada


Switzerland


Stockholm


UK


Barcelona


Zurich


Oslo


Lisbon


UK


Louisiana


Texas


Check out 'I Love My Life the Way it is'to see where you can send Ali cool lottery cards for her to leave unscratched.