This is a perfectly normal pin. On the head of it are 2.417 quintillion angels, give or take a few billion.

Joe Davis and Sarah Khan, the artist behind Baitul Ma’mur, (House of Angels) encoded the Arabic phrase “Subhan Allah” onto synthesized DNA, and then used that DNA to coat the head of a pin. According to some traditions, any time Subhan Allah is said or written, it creates an angel. With DNA being as dense an information storage medium as it is, this single pin has more created angels on it than have ever been born from human throats across all of human history.

And then in a fucking genius move, the art installation takes the form of a functional vending machine, loaded with an impossibly large quantity of angels. For $25, which goes right to the artists, you can buy a pin. I’m thinking about taking mine out of the test tube sometime and encasing it in resin to turn it into the highest % angel by volume earring ever worn, but that’s a project for the future.

There isn’t much else I can say that isn’t said by the documentation accompanying the exhibit. The photos aren’t the BEST quality but they should hopefully be mostly legible.