“In Cahoots” was a one day event in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood on Dec 10th 2022. LOOT is a unique collaborative venture bringing artists together to create currencies out of art mediums: paintings, sculptures and prints.
This year I created four gold coin sculpture collaborations. All LOOT coin sculptures were created with sculptor Jonathan Michael Johnson. Special edition coin designs were offered by artists Steve Seeley and Lauren Asta.
Like real money these physical pieces are also digital, connected to the Trove ID platform. This public fine art archive provides royalties for artists and a trusted marketplace with transparent histories of art for collectors.
I also created collaborative paintings with Steve Seeley and Lauren Asta. I allowed Steve and Lauren to decide what the paintings were about. I saw my job as depicting the value of the piece, in a way that complemented the work. As always, the paintings sold for the amount of coins in the painting ($50 a coin this year).
The last piece I created for the show was a limited edition print with artist and printmaker Andrew Ghrist of Firecrest Press. The unit of value for my paintings and sculptures has always been gold coins. I thought when creating a print, it made the most sense to print bills. So with the help of Andrew, that’s just what we did.
The print is front and back. Each bill represented $5, so each sheet of 18 sold for $90. I struggled with how to represent the bills for months. Instead of representing any specific bill, I tried to create placeholders representing what money is in general. The piece ended up becoming a stage with props, set to tell the story of money.
Overall the show was a big success. A huge thank you to the collaborating artists: Jonathan Johnson, Lauren Asta and Steve Seeley. A special thank you to Scud One for making a phenomenal mix of music that set the perfect mood throughout the night. To my parents for coming to help put up and take down the show in one day (while my usual partner in crime, my wife, looked after our new little one). And to everyone that made it to the show… you’re the reason I do it. Cheers
