Money, the new book edited by Tania Prill, Alberto Vieceli, and Sebastian Cremers (Edition Patrick Frey), features pictures printed on banknotes, magnified so that each line rendered is clearly visible to the eye, revealing the profound details that make each piece of currency a work of art in its own right.
Money is a book about art rendered in the service of commerce, of the pictures of political subject matter, historical milestones, distinguished personages, status symbols, and landscapes. Each banknote is presented in part, rather than in whole, focusing on a specific detail and devoid of the usual context we look for when handling banknotes. Without a country of origin or a monetary value assigned to the banknote, the editors force us to look at each image purely as a form of visual iconography.
The result is a study of symbols of power and strength, and how these popular motifs inform ideas about identity and wealth. Money presents carefully cropped images of natural and manmade glory, of everything from a rhinoceros to a jumbo jet, with each image evoking an individual nation’s deeply felt sense of self. Most of the images present evoke the heroism of the past, or the quiet grandeur of the common man, woman, and child. But within this mix are modern images of a snowboarder, a computer tablet, and a satellite in space, reminding us of the ever-evolving nature of the status symbol in modern life.
Although there are no captions or credits in the book, the currency of the United States is easily identified by its symbol of the Eye of Providence (or the all-seeing eye of God) radiating at the top of a pyramid. This image has become popular among conspiracy theorists, particularly those who believe this to be a symbol of the Illuminati, a secret society thought to be masterminding events and planting agents in the government and corporations in order to gain political power and establish a totalitarian world government.
In this way Money raises more questions than it can possible answer. What is the significance of the icons selected from each banknote, and what do they reveal about the people they represent. Devoid of context, it is impossible to know the story behind the image, and as such we must take it only as a decorative element that speaks to the human drive to symbolize meaning in order to establish value as a whole. The result is a sumptuous, albeit superficial, look at the human impulse to establish value through the formulaic creation of currency, each image as fantastical as it is familiar.
Images courtesy of Edition Patrick Frey
Miss Rosen is a New York-based writer, curator, and brand strategist. There is nothing she adores so much as photography and books. A small part of her wishes she had a proper library, like in the game of Clue. Then she could blaze and write soliloquies to her in and out of print loves.
