Cars and Money: The Exhibition — Interview with Reiner Opoku, Curator

New works by David LaChapelle titled "Cars and Money" were presented at the Wolfgang Roth and Partners FineArt Gallery during Art Basel Miami Beach 2009. Premier Guide Miami sat down to find out what that means — and what comes next.

New works by David LaChapelle titled "Cars and Money" were presented at the Wolfgang Roth and Partners FineArt Gallery during Art Basel Miami Beach 2009. The renowned photographer challenged viewers to think about our obsession with materialistic things and the sudden destruction it can cause.

Ranked among the top ten most important people in photography in the world by American Photo, David LaChapelle continues to be innovative in his art. Known for exploring themes relevant to our time and current economic culture, he has done it again with paper-sculptor exhibits of crashed cars and negative money.

The series represents a society built upon a house of cards, where there was no secure foundation by which the wealth was being supported — a misrepresentation of the reality of the economy, and a false sense of security. The fragile framework could no longer sustain itself, and the collapse was imminent.

Reiner Opoku, an international curator and contemporary art dealer, has been a leading figure on the global art market since 1983. He has managed premiere avant-garde artists such as Georg Dokopil and Martin Kippenberger, and worked on projects with Julian Schnabel and Sigmar Polke. As curator, he has delivered exhibitions of Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, and Josef Beuys in Tokyo, Prague, Vienna, Berlin, and Hamburg. He was recently the curator of the prestigious St. Moritz Art Masters (SAM).

PGM: When the words "car" and "money" come to mind, we do not think of them as destructive. Why car and money for this exhibit?

RO: The two series displayed here by David LaChapelle are called Cars and Money. The exhibit with cars is a collage of crashed or mashed-up cars — a symbol of the destruction of luxury. Once a car has been crashed or damaged, it no longer represents opulence or luxury. It is now insignificant. The other is about negative currency. Once a currency becomes negative — a debt — it has no value, as with the fall of Wall Street and the value of the dollar against the Euro. It is a representation of the times, what we are faced with now in our economy and everyday life.

PGM: You worked with David in 2008 on "Jesus is My Homeboy." Why bring him back this year?

RO: We have been working with David for many years. We had a show with him last year and felt we wanted to do something with him again for Miami Basel.

PGM: How was it working with David LaChapelle?

RO: As with every great artist, he is very easy to work with because they have the highest standard in quality in mind. If you accept that as a dealer and as someone working with him, it is easy. Everything that he does is made for his art, for what he wants to produce. You can be sure that you are receiving the best possible work. It may not come easy — it is all focus on the goal. The goal is to have the best possible work.

PGM: Whose idea was it to show this exhibit for Art Basel?

RO: The works were shown in a museum exhibition before. The programming for us was to select these two groups. The concept was to have these two groups of works in confrontation with each other. The prices vary between $30,000 and $85,000 for the pieces shown.

"Cars and Money: New Works" by David LaChapelle was on exhibition December 1, 2009 through February 13, 2010 at Wolfgang Roth and Partners FineArt Gallery, Miami Design District.

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