Galleri Specta in Copenhagen at Structural Patterns

Reflections on Art, Technology and Society

Galleri Specta in Copenhagen

Crumpled $500 bill featuring Angela Merkel made from felt by artist Andreas Schulenberg

Today, my second day in Copenhagen, art work in the gallery Specta caught my eye while wandering about the city, so my son and I walked in. The gallerist immediately greeted us and even gave us a tour of the show (as a New Yorker, I was immediately taken aback). The woman explained that the exhibition titled “Money Makes the World Go Round” (May 9 – June 13, 2015) features four international artists that use money as the subject of their work. All of them with a critical bend toward the power of money and yet featured in a swank art market gallery, of course.

Money Makes the World Go Round II by Carlos Aires

The central piece upon walking in to the space is “Money Makes the World Go Round II”, by Spanish artist Carlos Aires who cuts iconographic silhouettes from the currency of the 30 wealthiest countries to create a sphere strewn with what appear to be fruit flies. The sphere is formed by pining the cutout silhouettes and flies to a white canvas surface.

Also by Carlos Aires are a grid of collages that cut news print figures into the country’s currency.

Money Collage by Carlos Aires

In his multi-tiled piece titled “Domino” Swedish artist Lars Arrhenius represents the flow of a piece of currency from an ATM withdrawal to any number of exchanges until it is redeposited in to a bank.

Domino by Lars Arrhenius

South African artist Frances Goodman has created bills from woven beads, beads once functioning as currency in various cultures. And in a separate series Goodman creates drawings from fake eyelashes.

South African currency made from braided beads by Frances Goodman

My favorite and most striking work is by Danish/German artist Andreas Schulenberg who has created giant dollar bills from felt and in them replaced the portrait of a president with that of the “losers” in American society.