A billboard installed in the NYC neighborhood of Washington Heights during the fall of 2017, accompanied by an ongoing distribution of sizzle cards. The following text is taken from the press release:

Paradoxically, you do not own the money in your wallet. You own the value the money in your wallet represents, but you do not own the physical paper. In this way, paper currency is a type of abstracted public space, in that it is a shared material created to hypothetically facilitate cooperation and exchange between individuals.

We use money everyday, but hardly look at it. By presenting (Bill)board, Hoffmeister hopes to reacquaint visitors with something we all share. The value paper money represents is a double-edged sword; it is a force that can be harnessed for the benefit of a majority, or the greed of a minority. The billboard image is a scan of a twenty-dollar bill, chosen for its engraving of the White House. As the bill was scanned, glitches were formed by moving it in a specific pattern, suggesting a malfunction of the bill while also pointing toward a transformative force acting upon it.

To expand upon the visual impact of the billboard, Hoffmeister developed a companion piece, Withdraw Your Support. It consists of an unlimited edition of fake twenty-dollar bill “sizzle cards.” Instead of using the reverse of the fake bill as a space for advertising, the words “WITHDRAW YOUR SUPPORT” are written. The assumed monetary value of the fake bill is replaced by a message meant to call upon the public consciousness. These will be periodically dropped on sidewalks in the vicinity of (Bill)board and in New York City generally, where unsuspecting passersby will encounter them.

Peter Hoffmeister

Peter Hoffmeister