One Billion Dollar vs. Burning a Million Quid

Michael Marcovici's One Billion Dollar

Michael Marcovici's work One Billion Dollar is being dubbed as "the most expensive piece of art ever made." It's quite literally one billion dollars stacked on 12 pallets.

I thought I was experiencing déjà vu, because Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty did almost exactly the same thing fifteen years ago, but much better. In addition to stacking notes on palettes, they nailed money to boards, gave £40,000 to Rachel Whiteread for being "worst artist of the year" [for the record, I'm a big fan of Whiteread - but that's neither here nor there,] and in the end burned one million quid of their own money as performance art.


Bill Drummond shoots blanks over the audience at KLF's farewell performance

I'm not sure what Marcovici's intent is with his piece, or if he was even aware of the previous works, but it seems incredibly simplistic; a one-dimensional postmodern folly. Drummond and Cauty's work says more about the creative intensity of the artists themselves - bordering on self-loathing psychosis.


The K Foundation Burn A Million Quid documentary
[If the above clip doesn't work, click on "go to Google Video". It's well worth 48 minutes of your time. I've seen it a half-dozen times at least.]

The K Foundation Burn A Million Quid is less about the money or the act than it is about watching the pair lash out in all directions and then implode under their own internal strife. Were they geniuses or assholes? Probably both.

[Previously: KLF Appreciation Week]