Overview
In this highly entertaining book, Lawrence Weschler chronicles the antics of J. S. G. Boggs, an artist whose consuming passion is money, or perhaps more precisely, value. Boggs draws money-paper notes in standard currencies from all over the world-and tries to spend his drawings. It is a practice that regularly lands him in trouble with treasury police around the globe and provokes fundamental questions regarding the value of art and the value of money.
"Lawrence Weschler, who evidently admires [Boggs]-something not difficult to do-has written what may be the most extraordinary biography imaginable: "weird," to use a favourite Boggs word. It does something towards changing our entire outlook on money and its uses. And the reader is left with an uneasy feeling that anything in this world can be created by drawing it." —Ruth Rendell, Daily Telegraph
"As ideal a subject matter as money is for Boggs' genius, Boggs is as ideal a topic for Weschler's considerable talents. . . . A writer any less lucid than Weschler would smudge the lines, making of Boggs a counterculture caricature or a high-art huckster. And a writer any less confident would knock the balance, making academic mud pies of Boggs' enlightened chaos." —Jonathon Keats, San Francisco Chronicle Book Review
"[A] witty and engaging chronicle. . . . Weschler's fascinating account of the artist as agent provocateur demonstrates both the significance of Boggs's art and his determination to continue his unusual critique of the idea of money." —Henry Wessells, Washington Post Book World
"[A] witty, excellently written account of a bizarre and fascinating snippet of modern life." —Paul Ormerod, Times Higher Education Supplement
"The book, like the artist, challenges people to pause and consider the extent to which the economic bedrock of everyday life is in part a confusing welter of artistic abstractions. It's a work that is at once informative, entertaining, and provocative-a reading experience, one might say, of rather good value." —Toby Lester, Atlantic Monthly
"[A] fascinating tale, especially in these days of fluctuating currency rates, the euro, and inexplicable Net-stock valuations." —Paul Lukas, Fortune
Lawrence Weschler, a recipient of the prestigious Lannan Literary Award for 1998, is the author of numerous books, including Calamities of Exile: Three Nonfiction Novellas, and Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder, which was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award.
Synopsis
In this highly entertaining book, Lawrence Weschler chronicles the antics of J. S. G. Boggs, an artist whose consuming passion is money, or perhaps more precisely, value. Boggs draws money-paper notes in standard currencies from all over the world-and tries to spend his drawings. It is a practice that regularly lands him in trouble with treasury police around the globe and provokes fundamental questions regarding the value of art and the value of money.
The Times - Howard Davies
Boggs is an artist of sorts: one with a talent for drawing precise copies of banknotes. So precise are they that the Bank of England took him to court ten years ago for counterfeiting. (He was acquitted by a sympathetic jury, in spite of a hostile summing-up by the judge.) Whatever the legal status of his work, straightforward counterfeiting is not Boggs's game now, if it ever was. He does not seek to pass off drawings as authentic notes but he does seek to spend them.
Editorials
Howard Davies
Boggs is an artist of sorts: one with a talent for drawing precise copies of banknotes. So precise are they that the Bank of England took him to court ten years ago for counterfeiting. (He was acquitted by a sympathetic jury, in spite of a hostile summing-up by the judge.) Whatever the legal status of his work, straightforward counterfeiting is not Boggs's game now, if it ever was. He does not seek to pass off drawings as authentic notes but he does seek to spend them.— The Times
Publishers Weekly -
Just what is money worth? Or, what is the value of value? Funny questions, maybe, but they are central to the figure at the heart of Weschler's latest paper chase of a profile. J.S.G. Boggs is a slow-change artist. He draws legal tender--with varying degrees of realism--and attempts to spend it: at restaurants, hotels, airports, convenience stores and galleries around the world. He has been arrested for his aesthetic endeavors, stalked by British treasury cops, had his work confiscated by the Secret Service and been detained by baffled proprietors. Boggs's art--a brand of conceptual performance with roots in Duchamp and Warhol--is contingent upon the abysses of logic that open up when people are asked to accept his counterfeit bills not as actual money (Boggs isn't a con man), but as art. As art, of course, they are worth something. An anomaly, if not a minor celebrity, in certain corners of the art world, Boggs serves Weschler well as a springboard for thoughts on the protean nature of both art and money. With meandering brilliance and levity, Weschler delves not only into the outlandish antics of Boggs the provocateur, but also into the history of banking, the development of paper money and the valuation of art. One of the great, and usually convincing, spinners of true tales that seem tall, Weschler writes in an erudite yet nimble style--itself a great service to the popularization of ideas. (June) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.Library Journal
Weschler, a New Yorker writer who has written books on idiosyncratic, eccentric individuals Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonders, LJ 10/1/95, here turns his attention to J.S.G. Boggs, an American artist who specializes in drawing money. Boggs not only creates these art works but also exchanges them for food, goods, etc.; the transaction itself including receipts and change received makes up the complete work of art that is ultimately exhibited in galleries. The book studies Boggs's career and artistic theories, focusing on his run-ins with officials of the Bank of England and U.S. Treasury agents who take a dim view of his copies of their currency. Also examined are the depictions of money by other artists over the centuries and how Boggs's obsession reflects the relationship between money, art, and value. Recommended for all larger library collections, particularly those that specialize in modern art studies.--Morris Hounion, New York City Technical Coll., CUNY Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.Booknews
Chronicles the antics of J.S.G. Boggs, an artist who draws realistic paper notes in the denominations of standard currencies from all over the world, and then tries to spend the drawings as money. Instead of selling his money drawings outright to interested collectors, Boggs looks for merchants who will accept his drawings in lieu of cash payment. Follows Boggs through counterfeiting charges and currency capers, from galleries to the courtroom, and raises questions on the history of money and systems of value. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknew.com)Lester
The book, like the artist, challenges people to pause and consider the extent to which the economic bedrock of everyday life is inpart a confusing welter of artistic abstractions. It's a work that is at once informative, entertaining, and provocative—a reading experience, one might say, of rather good value.Atlantic Monthly
Mark Swartz
For 15 years, J.S.G. Boggs has asked people to accept his deliberately unrealistic-looking homemade money... He prefaces every transaction with the statement that the bills are not legal tender... In Switzerland, he says, they almost always take him up on his offer, though in Italy they almost never do.— Chicago Reader