TRAN$PARENT Money Games
TRAN$PARENT artist considers creativity to be the highest form of consciousness and is continuing his father’s legacy while transforming the meaning of money.
INTERVIEW WITH TRAN$PARENT ARTIST
TRAN$PARENT artist
LES COULEURS: What exhibitions are you working on or have you participated in?
TRAN$PARENT: I have participated in the prestigious Philadelphia Fine Art Fair, Palm Beach Art and Design Show, multiple private events and solo shows during Miami’s Art Basel, - Faena Hotel, SLS, Versace Mansion, The National Hotel and David Rosen's Gallery in Miami's Design District. I also participated in multiple crypto pop ups and shows in Aspen Gallery on Las Olas. My artworks were featured at private and public events on Worth avenue in Palm Beach at Provident Fine Art and the Palm Beach Design Showroom, the DCOTA building with Giovanni Rossi and the Reenvision Gallery with Vic Laguna. I was also a featured artist at Tiger 21 events in the $31M penthouse at the Porsche Design Tower. I did lots of pop ups and solo shows at the Crypto Castle Coachella, CA. Exhibited at Snapshot at the White Room Gallery in Bridge Hampton and Contra Gallery and Gallery 23 in Manhattan. I was a featured artist for Arnold Schwarzenegger’s charity gala at the Arnold Classic.
More recently I participated in the innovative show "NFT BAZL" at the Temple House in Miami and of course,- in Art Bound Miami's special private events, Fisher Island's Rendezvous, The Hearts and Stars Gala and soon to be featured at Richard Petty's Museum and in Las Vegas at several high-end hotels and casinos with some big name celebrities.
TRAN$PARENT artist
from artist’s archives
LC: What’s your background?
TRAN$PARENT: I have been painting and drawing since about the age of two or three, primarily on my parents walls, like most kids, but I have never stopped. After graduating from Indiana University Bloomington in 2004, it took me several more years to bring my TRAN$PARENT currency art idea to the masses, however I never stopped drawing, doodling, painting, playing, etc. All self taught.
LC: Why money?
TRAN$PARENT: Three main reasons: my father has an insane currency collection, something like 7.000 notes from around the world from different time periods. He would share them with me and I would always look at the bills and say: "this artwork is beautiful, but the bill is so bland," so I wanted to make money as vibrant and beautiful as the people that use it. Secondly, I wanted to create something that no one before me had ever done, and that is depicting a true single image TRAN$PARENT currency art showcasing the front of the bill, the back of the bill and all the hidden security features hidden in the middle of the bill on one solid image. I wanted to do a sort of an X-ray of the bill and use it as a metaphor for truth and transparency especially with one's own self. And lastly, I had an opportunity to meet and briefly work with the notorious Chicago Mob counterfeiter turned artist,- Arthur J. Williams Jr. and learn from him and get inspired to do my own form of currency art. It was a real blessing to learn from someone as wise and as powerful as him. He's the real deal!
LC: Do you interact with the digital world/technology in your work?
TRAN$PARENT: Only when I use professional cameras, scanners, X-ray technology, Photoshop or other programs to create designs for pieces or renderings for custom commissions. I also use some animation programs to create digital NFT’s, virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) scenarios.
TRAN$PARENT artist
from artist’s archives
LC: Professionally, what’s your goal?
TRAN$PARENT: My goal is to spread consciousness, creativity, confidence and truth through my art to every single soul on the planet. We live in a day and age where people love themselves more than others, yet are so bogged down by the opinions and images of others around them. I want to inspire healing and growth through creative consciousness and true confidence where you know you can take on the world and anything in it, without fear of rejection or disappointment. The world needs more go getters nowadays. I also want my works to be in MOMA, Smithsonian and Tate one day and God willing one day at the Louvre and digital NFT museums showing how an artist like me can capture a brief moment in history through physical and digital artwork of extreme quality and scale.
LC: Name three artists you’d like to be compared to.
TRAN$PARENT: Andy Warhol for the pop flare, Dali for the aesthetic eye and creativity, and Picasso for his innovative ideas. One of the most beautiful things that anyone has ever said to me was when famous art broker, Mary Ann Cohen, owner of MAC Fine Art, told me that she compared my single image TRAN$PARENT currency art to that of the innovative power of Picasso's Cubism. I was beyond humbled!
TRAN$PARENT artist
from artist’s archives
LC: Do you have a favorite photograph or painting, which inspires you?
TRAN$PARENT: The Declaration of Independence is my favorite piece of art. Basically, a bunch of rebels, with the average median age of only 26, got together to write a beautiful breakup letter to the most corrupt and powerful man in the world at the time. All for the opportunity to give everyone a better shot at owning property, worshipping who they wanted to and not getting taxed and persecuted to death. That's courage! The Founding Fathers weren't perfect, and I will be the first one to call them out on the aspects that I disagree with, but England was a true tyranny that we needed to free ourselves from.
LC: If you could work within a past art movement, which would it be?
TRAN$PARENT: Alongside Picasso's Anti-Nazi /Pro-Peace Movement! I always admired him for that!
from artist’s archives
LC: What role does the artist have in society?
TRAN$PARENT: To educate and inspire the masses, to show the world their creativity and talents. I believe creating is the highest form on consciousness. Also, to question the common narrative and invoke free thought among the creatures of this world. Ask yourself, - could this be better? Can we make this a better place for all of us to live? The answer is yes. Whatever you tell yourself in your mind, you can achieve in the real world. If you believe and want it bad enough. Anything, and I mean anything is possible!
LC: Which artist of the past would you most like to meet?
TRAN$PARENT: I have been inspired by so many great artists and ancient masters. I used to live in Europe and have visited almost every major museum in the world in over 50 countries in my travels. I have seen originals of all the Italian Renaissance Masters, the Dutch Masters as well as Monet, Van Gogh and Picasso. Including best living oil portrait painter in the world,- Rogerio Peixoto and pop artist Kyle Schindler. They all inspire me, but if I were only able to meet one it would be Salvador Dali, simply because he didn't take drugs, he was drugs and so am I.
TRAN$PARENT artist
from artist’s archives
LC: What is your greatest indulgence in life?
TRAN$PARENT: Can I mention it here? I'm a healthy, young, strong passionate Scorpio with a gorgeous, sweet and seductive girlfriend. Let's leave it at that. I also really enjoy great food, traveling and looking at a cool piece or someone's career come to full fruition.
LC: How would you define beauty in 140 characters or less?
TRAN$PARENT: Beauty is what the soul tells our eyes, brains and hearts what is real and identifiable!
LC: What art do you most identify with?
TRAN$PARENT: Anything that stimulates the mind, either through evoking thought or viewing stunning, jaw dropping, immeasurable, aesthetically creative beauty.
LC: What is your favorite art gallery in Miami and why?
TRAN$PARENT: David Rosen's Gallery. It’s so fresh and has so many talented and creative artists. It's truly a sight to see.
