The Almighty Dollar: Money as a Theme in American Painting

Nygren, Edward J.

doi:10.1086/496373

Cited by 7 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…Boggs is far from alone in his creative exploration of money. Indeed, Boggs Bills trail long legacies in trompe-l'oeil compositions ranging from eighteenth-and nineteenth-century prints (Cao, 2020), to paintings by William Michael Harnett, John Frederick Peto, John Haberle, and Victor Dubreuil (Drucker, 1992;Evans, 2012;Frankenstein, 1953;Nygren, 1988). Connections have been traced between Boggs's work and economic and aesthetic production (Shell, 1995(Shell, , 2013, gift exchange (Hoeller, 2010), and explorations of bureaucracy and networks (Saper, 2001;Taylor, 1992).…”

Section: Contrast Agentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Boggs Bills: Contrast agents in the art market and in law, or, how to make money as an artist

Steinberg

2023

Crime, Media, Culture

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Much has been written on the intertwined histories of art and money, from trompe-l’œil depictions of banknotes to so-called money art to the elements of trust and authenticity undergirding these arenas. Yet, what happens when an artwork representing paper money is inserted into the financial system itself? What mechanisms of monetary production and regulation are activated and revealed? In the 1980s and 1990s, artist JSG Boggs realized Boggs Bills — representations of banknotes that pulled the financial system and the laws regulating money into art, and likewise, pulled art into the machinery of finance and its governance. Alongside the more widely discussed modes of creative engagement such as intervention, culture jamming, and semiotic disobedience, I propose the term contrast agent to discuss the operations of Boggs Bills within the systems of art and law. This conceptualisation allows for a consideration of the laboratory-like mapping of the vectors of exchange performed by Boggs Bills as they weave through various bureaucratic systems. These works of art were injected into and circulated through different arenas of exchange, animating the bureaucracy that both constructs and regulates money.

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Section: Contrast Agentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Boggs Bills: Contrast agents in the art market and in law, or, how to make money as an artist

Steinberg

2023

Crime, Media, Culture

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“…According to Yamey (1989), the inclusion of accounting tools in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Dutch paintings represents accounting as synonymous with business success and wealth. Nygren (1988) suggests that the American paintings between the 1870s and 1900s represent changing times in business and wealth through the depiction of dollar bills. McGoun (2010) explores Gordon Gekko as a mythical archetype in the film Wall Street , in which Gekko is revered as a rule-breaker yet condemned as a manipulator of the financial system.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Accounting for play as work inThe Expense Account

Schrock

2018

QRFM

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Purpose This paper aims to examine how and why finance is represented in cultural products. Focussing on an illustration by Norman Rockwell for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post, this analysis suggests that financialization is represented through the technique of visually incongruent humour. Humour relays the cultural value of the separation of work and play, and financialization is a tool to make sense of play as work. Addressing why certain financial representations are produced highlights the influence of finance in determining how and what messages about financialization are made public. This analysis of a single illustration suggests a need for further research into comparative and contextual studies of culture and finance. Design/methodology/approach This paper is a qualitative analysis of The Expense Account (1957), a cover illustration for The Saturday Evening Post. Findings In analysing the visually incongruent humour of the illustration, the cultural value of the separation of work and play is muddied by the lack of supervision and undefined organizational space. Freedom of travel and lack of managerial presence suggest that travelling salesmen face anxiety and uncertainty in having to account for their fun activities as work. Accounting is one tool of financialization used to interpret play as work by employees. This illustration was produced in a for-profit context and was therefore influenced by the financial decisions of magazine editors and customers. Practical implications Interdisciplinary qualitative analysis of finance and humorous popular cultural images suggests that accounting is a financial tool for making sense of play as work outside fixed organizational spaces. Additional support is given for studying popular culture and finance together, as popular culture is produced within a financial system in which financial decisions determine humorous representations of financialization. Originality/value This paper adopts a financial perspective in examining a Norman Rockwell illustration and makes the case for examining how representations of financialization are made by humour and financial influence.

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Using Art (Paintings, Drawings, and Engravings) to Teach Economics

Watts

Christopher

2012

The Journal of Economic Education

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The Almighty Dollar: Money as a Theme in American Painting

Cited by 7 publications

References 0 publications

Boggs Bills: Contrast agents in the art market and in law, or, how to make money as an artist

Boggs Bills: Contrast agents in the art market and in law, or, how to make money as an artist

Accounting for play as work inThe Expense Account

Using Art (Paintings, Drawings, and Engravings) to Teach Economics

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