‘The work is that I have taken their money. It’s not theft. It is a breach of contract, and breach of contract is part of the work.’
When the Kunsten Museum of Modern Art in Aalborg, Denmark, handed over 534,000 kroner (£61,628) in hard cash to artist Jens Haaning he told them it would be used to recreate two older works. Instead he ran off with the whole lot.
The curators learned of Haaning’s deception – he insists it’s a work complete with title Take the Money and Run – only when they came to uncrate the money-based sculpture. The suspiciously light boxes were empty bar two empty picture frames.
The museum had expected a restaging of two conceptual projects from 2007 and 2010 by the Danish artist which feature the bank notes themselves, each representing the average annual income of a Danish citizen and an Austrian citizen. The museum says it gave Haaning the cash as a loan to recreate the works.
Speaking to the Danish radio programme P1 Morgen last week the artist said: ‘The work is that I have taken their money. It’s not theft. It is a breach of contract, and breach of contract is part of the work.’
He says he conceived of the project in response to what he says was an insufficient artist fee for inclusion in Working It Out, a group show on the theme of labour and economics.
‘I encourage other people who have just as miserable working conditions as me to do the same. If they are sitting on some shit job and not getting money and are actually being asked to give money to go to work, then take the box and [run] off’.
The museum say they expect the money to be returned at the end of Haaning’s show. So far the artist says he has no intention of doing so.
