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About the artwork

Paul Russo has created his own collection of crumpled up currency. What a cool project this is! They are made by a process of infusing plexiglass with heat, then shaping and distorting. The super sized money includes all the official markings as the real thing. They appear incredibly believable, except for the problem that you’d never get one of those to fit in your wallet. In the words of the artist, “…After hundreds of years of the printed word, ink on paper, is on it’s way out… Soon there will be no new magazines, no newspapers, no new books, everyone will have their reader, I-pad etc., to which they can download whatever they want, whenever they want, where ever they are. The last paper and ink to go away will likely be our paper currency.”

About the artist

American artist Paul Rousso is renowned for his concept, “Flat Depth”, which he has been refining his entire professional career, and which he sees as the logical progression of art. This aims to render a flat object three-dimensional, or to collapse a three-dimensional object into two-dimensions and is a fusion of countless complex artistic methods such as painting, printing, sculpting, welding, chemistry, digital manipulation, and digital printing. Through heat infusion on plexiglass, Rousso creates his captivating hyper-realistic, hyper-sized, pop-art inspired sculptures.

With influences ranging from Dr. Seuss to Roy Lichtenstein, Rousso casts his pop art sensibilities on a 21st-century scale. His first summer job - designing the Tribeca loft of Robert De Niro - combined with stints as a Hollywood scenic artist and a brief career steeped in the cosmetics industry as an art director, lend a wry touch to the social commentary woven through his work, and his vast and encompassing worldview flavors everything he creates. The ink and paper era is drawing to a close. “All this stuff,” as the artist puts it, “is going away.” Rousso's fascination with paper - currency, advertising, newspapers, magazines - its history and use, its rise and fall, is an emblematic theme reflected frequently in his compositions. Despite the complexity of Rousso's artistic output, the character and subject matter of the art are relatable to all citizens of the world, so much so that it practically jumps off the wall, and straight into the viewer's consciousness.