Column

Writer

Money

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International

Artists Books

The article presents a compilation of artistic undertakings, including Every Wall Drawing #146 by Benjamin Bruneau, the Protavillion 2010: Rosy by German art and architecture collective Raumlabor Berlin, and the graphic novel “Sword of My Mouth: A Post-Rapture Graphic Novel,” written by Jim Munroe and illustrated by Shannon Gerard.

Noteworthy

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Walter Phillips

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MOCA Toronto Sept

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Art Museum Sep 1

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Editorial

The cover of this issue depicts the artists Spartacus Chetwynd and Zoe Brown in _The Walk to Dover_, a film they made in 2005 in which they walk from London to Dover dressed as Victorian-era street urchins. Basing the film on the walk of the young David Copperfield, who runs away from London in the eponymous Dickens novel, Chetwynd, Brown, and a third companion, Joe Scotland, attempted to live off the land throughout their 10-day journey. Making a comparison to Copperfield, who left London to escape the brutal conditions of industrial servitude, _The Walk to Dover_’s creators deliver a critique of debt in contemporary society and gesture towards an impossible ideal.

This particular work, described in the interview between Chetwynd and David Lillington, reflects a utopian, anarchic spirit that underpins much of the contemporary art practice concerned with money, economics and systems of exchange. This trend has developed over the past decade—a response, arguably, to the lingering economic recession. Recently, artists Julieta Aranda and Anton Vidokle launched _Time/Bank_, a system for the exchange of skills that uses time as a standard measure rather than money. This subsequently lead to the creation of _Time/Store_, a space in New York City where one can either purchase or sell commodities, from food to electronics and art, using an official time-based currency designed by Lawrence Weiner, called Hour Notes. With participants providing services including translation, legal counsel, accommodation, offering to ask random strangers for their advice on how to finish an artwork, or hosting dinner parties, _Time/Bank_ operates as a parallel economy for artists and cultural workers, while also being a platform for collaboration.

Creating alternate forms of economic exchange is just one way of many that artists have engaged ideas and forms related to money. Artists have also produced their own currency, created their own monetary systems, created work that uses money as an object or material, and made works that use systems of monetary circulation for their realization. There are many precedents for the work of contemporary artists who use money as part of a material and conceptual practice. In 1919, Marcel Duchamp paid his dentist with a hand-drawn cheque, to be cashed at “The Teeth’s Loan & Trust Company,” and which he later bought back at a price much greater than its face value. And in 1980, Gerald Ferguson installed a cascading pile of pennies in a gallery for a sculptural work titled _One Million Pennies_. (Each time the work is exhibited, the presenting gallery is required to withdraw $10,000 worth of freshly minted pennies from a bank.) Both of these projects interrogate the idea of value itself, and the processes through which it is produced and maintained.

In addition to its purely material qualities, money is a vehicle for the transmission of value and meaning—for instance, indicating belonging to a social group or honouring state officials—in addition to the economic transactions it facilitates. Hijacking and subverting this process, between 1990 and 1999 Canadian artist Mathieu Beauséjour imprinted almost 100,000 Canadian bills with the text “Survival Virus,” which gave them additional value as art objects, and which eventually forced them out of circulation. In another project transforming the value of currency, Paul Couillard and Ed Johnson pounded Canadian and American pennies until they became indistinguishable from one another in a performance called _Sevenseason_, enacted at the Art Gallery of Hamilton in 2003\. Similarly, in _Plot, Engage, Disperse_, a performance they completed during Pride 2009 in Toronto, the artists imprinted triangles onto pennies, which they then distributed to passersby.

Work related to this theme also sometimes explores the relationship between commercial concerns and the transcendent or the sublime. In a recent show at Jessica Bradley Art + Projects in Toronto, Montreal-­based artist Nicolas Baier exhibited an enlarged replica of a meteorite called _Star (Black)_ (2010), made from a 3D scan of a graphite meteor found in Arizona, and _Nugget_ (2010), created from donated gold objects that a jeweller melted and formed into a nugget. (The exhibition also included a legend with a photograph of each gold object and a brief description of its significance to the respective donor.) The price of the nugget was set in accordance with the price of gold on the New York, London and Tokyo stock exchanges on the day of sale, and the artist instructed that the same conditions apply to any future sale of the work.

There is a scientific basis to the association between gold and the otherworldly, and to the eternal, as evoked by Baier’s installation. In her essay, Marina Roy notes that gold is not created on earth but comes from other parts of the cosmos, formed through nucleosynthetic processes that accompany supernovae. The conversion of base materials into gold was a concern of medieval alchemists and part of a quest for the transcendent and the eternal, which continues to be vigorously pursued by contemporary biomedical scientists. In discussing the abandonment of the gold standard in 1971 by the US government, Roy examines the shift from a stable and inert measure of value to economies where life-forms themselves become, as she writes, “branded by capital.” Paired with Abbas Akhavan’s artist project, _what is above is as that which is below…_ (2010), it forms a provocative consideration of the conditions of the body within contemporary economies, reconciling ideas of physical transcendence and bodily abjection. Further exploring the theme of money, Richard Ibghy and Marilou Lemmens’ _Economies of Faith_ looks at how Mark Boulos, Melanie Gilligan and Olivia Plender expose the irrational, subjective and occult nature of the market.

However, regardless of whether money is actually part of either the form or the content of an artwork, art and money are always closely connected. Like all cultural practices, artists are in the business of creating value—and something transcendent—from ordinary, often devalued materials. None of the artists and writers in this issue, however, present alchemical solutions to today’s economic problems, but they do help us engage them in critical and significant ways. Who says art doesn’t pay?

Amish Morrell is Assistant Professor at OCAD University, where he teaches Criticism & Curatorial Practice, and Visual and Critical Studies.

Editor

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Economy

Social

The article presents the editor’s perspective regarding how contemporary artists engaged forms and ideas related to money, economics, and systems of exchange.

Editorial: In The Money

Feature

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Politics

The article discusses the artistic representations of the U.S. securities industry as a domain in which the production and distribution of valued commodities can be reconsidered. It notes that the artists have politicized the economy through a process of profanation. It mentions that a more secularized society has dislodged the stability of the securities market.

Economies of Faith

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History

Accompanying text to Abbas Akhavan’s artist project. The author discusses what she sees as humanity's obsession with gold, and the mineral's influence on humans in various aspects. The author briefly explores the history of humankind, highlighting humanity's quest for all things gold, including the matters of aesthetics, alchemy, and most notably, economics, among others.

Holy Shit

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Curatorial practice

Exhibitions

The article presents a conversation between Adam Lauder of York University and artist Vincent Bonin regarding the visible transformation in the material status of administrative documents.

Documents of Self-Administration: A Conversation with Vincent Bonin

Interview

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An interview with contemporary artist Spartacus Chetwynd is presented. When presented with the statement by Delomore Schwartz that money is spiritual, Chetwynd responded that money is a tool, a tangible way to deal with exchange depending on how it is used. Chetwynd shared her view on the difference of British socialism and the American idea of socialism.

New Ways to Go Forward You Never Dreamed Existed: David Lillington Interviews Spartacus Chetwynd

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Text

Language

Location

An interview with multimedia artist Divya Mehra is presented. When asked to comment on the development of her visual presentations from humorous to cutting, Mehra elaborated her personal and educational background of art. Mehra notes that she is attracted to notions of power that influence behavior and events.

Both Teams Cannot Win: Natasha Bissonauth Interviews Divya Mehra

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Chris Lee is a graphic designer and educator based in Buffalo, New York and Toronto. His research explores graphic design’s entanglement with power, standards and legitimacy. Chris is an Assistant Professor at the University at Buffalo SUNY.

Designer

Publisher

Artist Project

Artist

Artist project by Tehran-born and Toronto-based artist Abbas Akhavan.

Centrefold: what is above is as that which is below… 

Review

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Photography

Sculpture

Canadian

The article reviews the exhibition “Annie MacDonell: Beside the Midnight Lake at the Katharine Mulherin Gallery in Toronto, Ontario featuring the photographic works and sculptures of Annie MacDonell.

Annie MacDonell: Beside the Midnight Lake

Saelan Twerdy is a writer, editor, and cultural worker based in  
Tiohtià:ke/Montreal. He is the Managing Editor of RACAR, the  
official journal of the Universities Art Association of Canada, and currently works as a Student Librarian at Concordia University Webster Library.

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Music

Video

The article reviews the exhibition “Music Video,” by the Musée d'art Contemporain de Montréal in Quebec which features video-art pieces and music videos of musicians.

Projections: Music Video

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Drawing

The article reviews Guy Ben-Ner’s exhibition “Thursday the 12th” at Mass MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts.

Guy Ben-Ner: Thursday the 12th

Kenneth Hayes is an architectural historian and a critic of contemporary art.

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Education

The article reviews an exhibition at the Galerija Siz in Rijeka, Croatia of the ABS Group, which is composed of painters Alan Alebić, Ivica Blažić, and Ivan Skvrce.

The ABS Group: The ABS Art Practice Imagined as a Class Struggle in College Art Education

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Installation

The article reviews Rivane Neuenschwander’s exhibition “A Day Like Any Other,& at the New Museum in New York.

Rivane Neuenschwander: A Day Like Any Other

Shannon Anderson is an independent writer, curator and editor based in Oakville, Ontario.

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Nature

The article reviews Anselm Kiefer’s exhibition “Palmsonntag,” at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, Ontario featuring a 30-foot palm tree.

Anselm Kiefer: Palmsonntag

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The article reviews the exhibitions of Fernando Sánchez Castillo and Oscar Muñoz presented at the13th edition of “PhotoEspaña” annual international festival of photography and visual arts in Madrid, Spain.

Fernando Sánchez Castillo: National Episodes and Oscar Muñoz: Becoming Air

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Multi-disciplinary

The article reviews the 6th Berlin Biennale exhibition “What is Waiting Out There” in Berlin, Germany.

6th Berlin Biennale: What is Waiting Out There

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The article offers information on the online media project “Fashion Blog: Clothes for president,” by Jon McCurley.

Jon McCurley: Fashion Blog-Clothes for president

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Indigenous

The article reviews the book “Art and Cold Cash,” edited by Ruby Arngna’naaq, Jack Butler, Sheila Butler, Patrick Mahon, and William Noah.

Art and Cold Cash, Edited by Ruby Arngna'naaq, Jack Butler, Sheila Butler, Patrick Mahon and William Noah.

The article reviews the book “Green Light: Towards an Art of Evolution,” by George Gessert.

Green Light: Towards an Art of Evolution, by George Gesset

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Cultural Studies

The article reviews the book “The Power of Judgment: A Debate on Aesthetic Critique,” edited by Daniel Birnbaum and Isabelle Graw.

The Power of Judgment: A Debate on Aesthetic Critique, Edited by Daniel Birnbaum and Isabelle Graw

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Issue 108