Ten Decrees: Old Masters, New Money

On August 15, 1971, Richard Nixon announced that he had directed Treasury Secretary John Connally “to suspend temporarily the convertibility of the dollar into gold.” The suspension was never lifted. Fifty-five years later to the day, Lucho Poletti unveiled the first of ten drawings responding to that decree.

Europe had experienced its own monetary upheavals. Hieronymus Bosch and Pieter Bruegel the Elder worked during an era of expanding banking, credit, and speculation. Antwerp, where Bruegel worked, became one of Europe’s great commercial centers. Both painters populated their compositions with hundreds of figures, constructing elaborate worlds in which human behavior,…

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