Take the money and run

Just what is art, anyway? Also, 7 other things.

I have sat here for an hour, maybe, thinking about the story I’m about to share. I can’t settle on whether it’s brilliant or pure theft. Let me know what you think.

My symbolic recreation of Jens Haaning's work.

In 2007, a Danish artist named Jens Haaning borrowed €25,700 (roughly $29,825) from a local bank.

He took the funds in cash— 51 x €500 notes, 2 x €200 notes, plus a couple of coins—and framed it, calling his creation, "An Average Austrian Year Income, 2007."

(I’m kind of afraid of getting sued for embedding a copyrighted work of art in this newsletter, but you can see what it looked like if you click here and scroll down.)

People thought it was clever, so Haaning did it again a few years later, this time calling the work, "An Average Danish Year Income, 2010.”

Then 11 years went by, and a Danish museum, the Kunsten Museum of Modern Art, reached out asking if Haaning would want to recreate the updated artwork once more, for an exhibit in their museum on “the future of labor.”

Sure th…