Download files
Abstract
In certifying fiat money, printing technology articulates an ambiguous position with regard to the craft of
counterfeit. Printed security designs have to first ‘forge’ value in a document before they can proscribe against its
imitation. They perform this duplicitous operation thanks largely to an ornamental graphic language that is abstract
and which has its origins in 17th Century calligraphic traditions and 19th century engraving machines. These have
converged to form a type of monetary signification that identifies printed money as such and by convention, creates
its apparently intrinsic value.
This research is concerned with analysing the process of monetary signification: how it derives from the hieratic
form of the banknote and is then communicated to a range of lesser documents that borrow from money’s prestige
and status. These documents include lottery tickets, manufacturer’s guarantees, advertising ephemera and university
diplomas. The credibility of each is underwritten by the technologies and processes of printed reproduction.
Undertaken in a period that is popularly regarded as being the threshold of money’s disappearance into pure
numeration, this research is concerned with the following questions: how did money came to look like itself, how do
other things come to look like money, and what was ever at stake in money being visible?