I am a sucker for art that is gun related. Combine that with my favorite smell which is money, and it’s no wonder I had to wipe the drool off my chin when I first saw these:
American artist Scott Campbell most known for his tattoo art, creates these by laser cutting stacks of $1 bills.
I always thought that tampering with U.S. currency was a federal offense, and sure enough:
U.S. Code TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 17 > § 333. Mutilation Of National Bank Obligations
Whoever mutilates, cuts, defaces, disfigures, or perforates, or unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national banking association, or Federal Reserve bank, or the Federal Reserve System, with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both. (Source)
I’m not quite sure how Scott dodges prison time while publicly taking hundreds of bills out of circulation for each one of these pieces of art, but frankly I’m glad the government seems to be turning a blind eye.
Scott Campbell’s Personal Homepage – HERE
He has an upcoming exhibit in NYC (April 29 – May 29, 2010) – INFO
Comments
7 responses to “Money, Guns, Art – Scott Campbell”
wow that is neat. Too bad that art is probably worth 100x the money it is done on :/ so no affordable to most of us.
ugh no kidding! If it was even 2 or 3 times the cost of the money used I would get one. But you’re probably right about it being way more than that.
Does he join the bills together then cut them? or cut them, and then put them together some how?
I have no idea. If I had to guess, I’d say he cuts out each layer individually then combines them due to the possibility of a fire starting and ruining the whole piece.
[…] my Money, Guns, Art – Scott Campbell post I mentioned how I have a weakness for weapon related art, and how I love the smell of […]
Neat art. As to how it’s not illegal for him to cut up bills like that, it’s in the last line of the statute: “with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued”. You can do whatever you want to money as long as you don’t try to spend it. Which is good, because if I had to serve 6 months for every penny that I flattened on the train tracks, I’d be in for life lol.
haha yea I still have a bunch of pennies that I flattened a long time ago too! Makes sense if the law is the way you said it is.