The exhibition is about the duality between function and form that the artist shows through cross-references between different objects, some with a form-function: tool and bunker; and others with a form-symbol: jewel and church.  The title Can-ni-faire is an expression used by diamond cutters in Antwerp since the end of the 19th century when sorting rough stones. It combines words in three languages to designate stones that cannot be cut because of their hardness and are only used to cut other diamonds (tool/jewel).  

In the exhibition there are also references to the Atlantic Wall, a belt of bunkers created during World War II on the Atlantic coast from France to Norway, as well as references to the Brutalist architecture of the 1970s in which bare materials (such as exposed concrete) are used and to representative works of this movement such as the bunker-church by the architect Claude Parent, the thinker-urbanist Paul Virilio and more recent examples such as the church of Nuestra Señora de la Coronación by Miguel Fisac in Vitoria.

Xabier Salaberria's work is based on the construction or design of structures made from different types of elements. He handles notions that could be situated between sculpture, architecture, design and furniture. In all his exhibitions, the works maintain a close relationship with the architectural elements of the space and the exhibition device becomes a part of it.