I just recently had a quick look back through some of my favourite pages on Stumble Upon and top of the list is this one about tattoo artist Scott Campbell.
If you have a chance to check the link out you'll see some truly fascinating sculptures that are made by laser cutting the shapes out of stacks and stacks of...wait for it....
US dollars!
The images he uses as a base for his sculptures are traditional fare for a tattoo artist - lots of skulls, flames, spider webs, butterflies, etc - and the article points out the contrast between on one side the notions of wealth, plenty, and the lack of concern about 'wasting money' (one of the pieces is made up of $11,000 in uncut but genuine currency), and on the other side what could be considered "working class" imagery. Now I'm not sure how comfortable I am with that particular terminology, as I don't think the imagery is exclusive to class, but as I mentioned before it is indeed reminiscent of traditional, All-American, tattoo imagery, which I suppose you could argue is not commonly associated with the upper echelons of society.
But it does also shock, as the use of so much money seem to directly contradict the notion of the starving artist who has to live from hand to mouth - just how did this guy get all that money I wonder. You could of course see it is a visual representation of an attempt to free oneself from the shackles of money - it reminds me of Rage Against The Machine's music video for 'Sleep Now in the Fire' when they occupied Wall Street, and where a homeless man wins a wheelbarrow-ful of cash on a game show, only to walk away in disgust at the money hungry audience and TV host. History seems to have repeated itself of late, with the Occupy Wall Street movement of the past two months protesting against greed and corruption, and indeed yesterday saw 30,000 take to the streets in NYC, and all entry points to the New York Stock Exchanges were blockaded.
But back to the art. To my mind, what is particularly interesting is the motif of the skeleton in several of the pieces, which acts like a 'memento mori' (latin for "Remember your mortality"). In my opinion, it seems to be talking about how wealth, and the material things we spend our money on, amounts to very little when we die in the end, but also how excessive wealth can be a destructive force in the world. The economic downturn that was caused by recklesd and unregulated lending and gambling of wholly intangible sums of money has been the downfall of many big businesses and banks, which sadly had the knock on effect of making the world a pretty damn impossible place to live for the all those little guys across the world who lost their businesses or their job, their savings, their homes, and in some cases their families, and so on and so forth. For some people the credit crunch really was the final nail in the coffin.
And in many ways we still can't get our heads around numbers that are so huge. When I was a student, I tried my best to pay attention in Finance classes, and although the lecturer was young, pleasant, and dare I say it, vaguely attractive, it was still so dry, that I didn't even bother attempting to revise Finance for the exam and just hoped that I could answer enough accounting questions to pass (it worked by the way). But there is one thing that the lecturer did pass on which was the link to the following article about how to understand the phenomenally gargantuan numbers sprawled across the news about debts, losses, bail outs, deficits, and so on.
In some ways, I think that this is also another aspect of what Scott Campbell is trying to accomplish with his dollar sculptures. By highlighting the waste involved in creating his pieces, he is also helping us visualise money in more tangible terms. I mean, let's be honest, if we actually had to keep all our actual money (excluding credit and overdrafts) at home under the mattress in $1 bills (or £5 notes) then we'd probably think it looked like a lot, but you would soon be able to see the pile grow smaller and smaller as you had to spend it. But as it is we keep our money in a bank, where we have an overdraft, and most likely a credit card (and a lot of people have more than 1). We spend our money electronically for the most part nowadays too, and I think that is another reason why it has become so easy over the past decade for 'spendaholics' to get into debt.
If I were ever in a position to actually want a Louis Vuitton handbag that cost, let's say £450, then I (personally) would be 100 times less likely to purchase it if I had to hand over £450 in cash than if I could just whack it on a credit card. My boyfriend Tom, as a matter of fact managed to get out of his overdraft relatively quickly by just taking out £10 cash per week to spend on non-essential items (so anything apart from food, fuel, and rent etc), and he felt that having his spending money in cash was a much better way of making sure he stuck to his budget, because when it was gone it was gone. This is something that I really want to try as I hate having to pay overdraft fees, so the sooner I get out the better.
But I digress. One final comment on this work and then I'll leave it for today. I mentioned earlier the skull and skeletons can be seen as a reminder of our mortality and our impermanence in this world, and it seems nowadays that not a lot lasts for very long. In today's 'throw away society' it is not only appliances and computers that are no longer built to last (it's called planned obsolescence I believe), but even the latest fashions that we wear and the newest bands and pop stars that we listen to are all produced to be lusted over, consumed, and almost immediately forgotten as soon as the next big thing comes along. So the fact that these sculptures were created by a tattoo artist, whose day to day job is to create artwork that does for the most part endure is an interesting contrast.
Once again, I feel as if I really want to get the tattoo I've wanted for the last couple of years, but sadly I can't afford it right now...
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