Using money to suspend heavy or fragile objects

The author suspends a 700-lb steel money safe from the ceiling, using ropes constructed from approximately 10,000 United States $1 bills. The role of money in this artwork is compared and contrasted with the role of money in artworks by other contemporary artists. It is noted that the presence of money has an irritating effect on most viewers, and hypothesized that this effect is based on the installation's exposure of differences in financial wealth between different persons. Accordingly, a proposal is made for the reduction of economic inequality by wasting the excess wealth of the very rich, and it is suggested that the author's artwork both enacts and visually supports this proposal.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Architecture.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2003

Author dc:creator

• Ela, Jedediah Smith, 1979-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Krzysztof Wodiczko.

• Architecture.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/65734

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/65734