Filthy Lucre Ain't Nothing New is an exploration of the complicated seduction and repulsion of money. The exhibition title comes from the Sex Pistol's song "The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle." The full lyric goes: "Filthy lucre ain't nothing new…we're all just cash from chaos." The Sex Pistols were unashamed of swindling the rock 'n' roll industry as a coup benefitting themselves and the rowdy punk rock revolution. They asserted that all cultural output eventually becomes a commodified product under capitalism, so why not be a winner in a system within which no one is innocent?
My choice of making art on a 1937 Packard was inspired by its aesthetic similarity to a Rolls-Royce Phantom of the same era. In a collaboration with Jamie Reid, the graphic artist for the Sex Pistols, I created an illustration of a Rolls-Royce Phantom on fire to proclaim the dead end of classism, ostentatious luxury, and the empire mentality. In this sense, painting with gold on a 1937 Packard to create a high-value, beautiful automotive art object raises questions about creativity and capitalism, and becomes uncomfortably paradoxical. Hopefully, this discomfort forces the audience to wrestle with the complex nature of capitalism itself.
-Shepard
PRINT DETAILS: Filthy Lucre Ain't Nothing New. 24" H x 18" W. Screen print on 80# cream Speckletone paper. Signed by Shepard Fairey. Numbered edition of 500. $70.
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