Find a Penny, Pick it Up

Jack Daws, an American artist, created counterfeit pennies. The coins, which were 18-karat gold plated in copper, were sold to art collectors for $1,000 per penny, according to ArtsJournal.com.

Daws created 10 different coins, which differed only slightly in weight and size from a real penny. He sold nine, but dropped the tenth into circulation as part of an experiment in the value of money.

That tenth penny, which has been floating through tip-jars and cash registers for the past two years, resurfaced this month. A woman in New York City contacted Daws after she realized the penny was special. Daws had left the penny at the Los Angeles International Airport.

Jessica Reed, the finder of the golden penny, is an artist herself with an interest in currency. 

Billboard Banditry

New York City artists have taken to the streets in a move of guerilla advertising. Or anti-advertising, rather.

The Public Art Campaign organized artists to hit the streets of New York and paint over billboard advertisements, reported the Gothamist.

The artists were organizing against what they call illegal advertising locations in the city. Citing lax enforcement for advertising licensing and policing, the artists went out to turn billboards into public art installations.

In broad daylight, teams of artists wearing orange construction vests arrived at various urban locations to first white-wash, then paint feel-good images of animals and slogans like “Hug Life” on their billboard-cum-canvases.

Reportedly, the advertising company responsible for the billboards responded within hours, repainting the billboards with fresh advertisements. 

Swine-Flu Cereal  

Rice Crispies, long a staple of the breakfast cereal market, has recently upped its claims to a breakfast cereal of choice, playing on the hype and paranoia about swine-flu.

Kellogg’s has come under criticism because it has labeled its breakfast cereal as good for children’s “immunity”, reported USA Today.

The cereal contains several added nutrients supposedly able to help with the immune system, and though cereal-box promotion campaign doesn’t mention H1N1, it all but spells out its preying on swine-flu scare.

As H1N1 vaccine lines grow, and priority lists become more rigorously enforced, it makes sense that consumers will look in new places for healthy help, but who knew sugar-coated Cocoa Krispies in aisle five at Safeway would do the trick? 

Disney: Back to Basics

Disney, after vowing back in 2003 to abandon paper-and-pen animation, have reneged on their next animated film.

Walt Disney followed Pixar and Dreamworks into the realm of digital animation in the earlier 2000s, but the children’s film-giant has decided to go old school with its next film, The Princess and the Frog, reported The Wall Street Journal.

While it’s no more expensive to produce a hand-drawn animated film than a computer-animated film, Disney hopes that a return to the more traditional type of movie-making, combined with a more traditional musical-style story will grab a new audience of viewers who have been raised on digital films likeWall-E and Ice-Age.

One of the biggest obstacles to a return to hand-animation is locating the appropriate studio equipment. In addition to ditching artists and animators in 2003, Disney also let go of all kinds of equipment used in making hand-drawn cartoons, like light-tables and flip-books.

Published in Volume 64, Number 10 of The Uniter (November 5, 2009)