"Reigning Capital" Satirical Bond Paperwork Collage by Mickey "Kano" Kane

Details

Description

"Reigning Capital" Satirical Bond Paperwork Collage

Elaborate collage by Mickey "Kano" Kane (American, 20th century). This piece is a satirical … Read more "Reigning Capital" Satirical Bond Paperwork Collage

Elaborate collage by Mickey "Kano" Kane (American, 20th century). This piece is a satirical collage that mimics the ornate design of a bond certificate to critique the fragility of global systems and the false promises of progress. In the center of the piece is the collaged body of a woman. Her head is replaced with the top of a perfume bottle, her stomach appears distended and bruised, and her legs overly thin. Across her neck, "United States of America," is emblazoned in the font used in American currency. Beneath the figure is the phrase "reigning capital either nourishes the majority with equity or turns into an / art form." The abstract shapes found along the bottom of the composition are composed of elements such as the American flag, images of the white house, and the words "margin of terror: bogus currency = turgid art." These details underscore the work’s poetic indictment of capitalism’s detachment from human cost, particularly the commodification of beauty and the devaluation of art. Visually rich and symbolically loaded, the piece confronts viewers with the uneasy trade-offs embedded in the concept of “value.”

Signed "Kano" in bottom right corner, dated "1990" in bottom left corner.
Paper size: 21.5" H x 28.88" W

Mickey “Kano” Kane (American, 1939-2002) was born in Illinois and grew up in Sacramento, CA. Kane moved to the Pacific Coast and worked on mixed media panels - which he would refer to as a “Totem” – and detailed collage compositions. His collage work is generally satirical or critical in nature, frequently dealing with themes of money, capitalism, government, power, and debt. By contrast, his “Totem” sculptural work is abstract and free of direct symbolism, focusing instead on the aesthetics of the composition.

Original Member, Artist’s Cooperative Gallery

Artist’s Statement:
The Totem is indicative of the unfolding 21st Century, graphically and metaphorically. It is neither one side nor the other, nor does one side challenge or compete with the other. Each side cooperates and thus enhances the other so that both "sides" transcend that definition into a composition revealing that, indeed, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The Totem reflects the inner harmony that all sides, whether two or two thousand, are striving to manifest in their own inimitable way. See less