Making Money

A whimsically designed facsimile of a unique book of drawings made by Andy Warhol that celebrates the dollar sign as lingua franca. Few artists made money their concern as openly as Andy Warhol. He made many pronouncements on his fascination with the dollar ("Big-time art is big-time money"), both as a symbol and as something he cherished, and so it was only natural that the dollar sign itself, one of the most recognized symbols anywhere in the world, that international denominator of currency, should enter the Pop art pantheon. Created in 1981 as a Christmas gift for Berkeley Reinhold, the cousin of the visionary curator and critic Henry Geldzahler and the daughter of one of Warhol’s closest friends, this book begins with simple outlines and curves, and builds, with a flipbook-like genesis, from unique abstract drawings to recognizable images of the artist’s inimitable dollar sign. Lighthearted, but with a hint of serious intent, it is an astute expression of how Warhol reveled in the vicissitudes of art and commerce, fortune and circumstance.