Lars Kræmmer - Artmoney
edited by Raffaele Loffredo
Lars, your artmoney project seemed very interesting and original to me. How does artmoney start and develop, from Denmark to other countries around the world?
I started the artmoney project by myself in 1997. It was meant as an artistic investigation into money - or rather into the exchange of value. I was surprised to find, that shops were willing to accept artmoney as part payment from day one! At first, I bought a CD from a music store. The next thing I bought was building materials for a house, and then I build a house. The next year a Danish artist joined the project, and we established the first web site. Soon after this, I made an artmoney exhibition in New York City and in Vancouver/Canada, and artists from these countries joined as well. Since then it has been spreading via word of mouth, exhibitions and media attention.
Membership of artmoney involves using small artworks as money to be exchanged or used for different types of services. Tell us how it works exactly and how to join it.
Artmoney holds a fixed size of 12x18 cm, but it can be as thick as you wish. It also holds a fixed value of Danish Kroner 200, which means that artists around the world are all worth the same, when it comes to artmoney. You can see here, how to make artmoney: https://artmoney.org/how-make-artmoney Artists join by purchasing a profile for Danish Kroner 456,25 per year. This allows the artist to upload- and sell their artmoney on the web gallery. All the profit from sales goes directly to the artist (except a cut to PayPal). As a member artist, you are also invited to participate in the many group exhibitions, that are constantly being arranged. New exhibitions are posted on the front page of the artmoney site, or on the Facebook artmoney page: https://www.facebook.com/artmoney.org
Since it is possible for the artist to create their own money by hand, it allows him/her to buy services and things from the shops that are associated. It is also possible to spend artmoney at other shops, that have never heard about artmoney. It is simply a question of asking, and you might get a NO or a YES! I spend 100% artmoney at my dentist, who is not on the list! Find the list of associated shops here: https://artmoney.org/shops. It is free to join with a "Shop profile." The artists will have to buy an "Artist profile" in order to JOIN. The price is very cheap, and they only need to sell 2-3 artmoney to make up for the price of a whole year. I have tried to give people a free membership, but it always seems, that those who get it for free will never use it, so I stopped doing that.
I am happy to collaborate with artmoney, creating a bridge with Italy and proposing the membership of both my accommodation (Art&Bed) and some of my artists. How do you think this collaboration between the two countries could be expanded?
I would be very happy to collaborate with you and Italy. I am a big fan of the art of Rocco, and I am excited to see what other Italian artists make. I think it would be a great start of the collaboration if we could create a group artmoney exhibition in Italy and invite artists from the entire network to join. This would be fun for all the artist around the world, because it would mark the first Italian artmoney show! Also it would be good for local artist in Italy to see, what kind of artmoney people make in other countries.
