MORE ON MONEY ARTIST J.S.G. BOGGS

I first met Boggs at the 1994 American Numismatic Association convention in Detroit.

He was a character. But to me he seemed to be a character who would appeal to the numismatic hobby.

He did.

I commissioned him to do a special Boggs bill, as his notes were called.

It was used as a Bank Note Reporter subscription premium in connection with the 40th anniversary of the Florida United Numismatists in January 1985.

I was editor of Bank Note Reporter at the time as well as Numismatic News.

Those who paid $40 to cover a one-year-subscription to Bank Note Reporter for $29 and $10 to buy a Boggs “FUN 40 print” received a Boggs $1 bill in “change.”

We had 500 of an edition of 900 Boggs Funbacks created for the FUN show.

Each piece was serially numbered. Ours were 101-500.

Naturally, the Boggs bill was based on real money, the back of a $1 bill.

It was orange. What other color would you use for the FUN show?

We had a buyer stampede on our hands.

The 500 pieces went like hotcakes.

Some went to new subscribers. Some went to renewals.

Since Bank Note Reporter’s circulation at the time was less than 5,000, you can see how this impacted our sales.

Of the remaining notes, 300 Boggs planned to frame and sell in Europe for $250 each.

Did he do that? I don’t know.

Of the first 100 notes, 40 were given to FUN dignitaries on the condition they “spend” them.

The other 60 went to the FUN organization to use as it pleased.

Dealer Craig Whitford advertised to buy any of the serial number 1-40 notes for $40 each.

Collectors chased the notes on the secondary market.

It was a great success.

But like all successes, the novelty value eventually wore off.

Boggs stopped traveling in collector circles.

Will his passing lead to a revival in interest in his Boggs bills?

I hope so.

His reputation deserves it.

To read the complete article, see:
Money artist Boggs dies in Florida (www.numismaticnews.net/buzz/money-artist-boggs-dies-florida)

J.S.G. Boggs was kicked out of Brandon High School in the 11th grade but went on to become an artist of international acclaim, a merry prankster with a flair for publicity and an iconoclast whose disturbingly precise drawings of cash stirred up legal trouble on three continents.

Finally, the arc of his nonconformism brought him back to Tampa, specifically to Room 128 of the Howard Johnson Hotel near Tampa International Airport. It was there that Tampa police found him dead Sunday. He was 62.

Police say they do not suspect foul play. The Hillsborough County Medical Examiner's Office said there was no trauma, and a determination of the cause of death is pending the results of toxicology tests.

Mr. Boggs's full name was James Stephen George Boggs, but he was better known as J.S.G. Boggs and often just as "Boggs." His art was all about money.

The George Washingtons on his "Boggs bills" sometimes faced the wrong way. Some were drawn laughing. Others crying. On some notes, Mr. Boggs' own face appeared in place of the dead presidents. Others he signed above phrases like "crazy cash" or "for what it's worth."

Often it was worth more than enough to bring Mr. Boggs meals, art supplies, cab fare, clothes, rented flats, even legal services and stocks and bonds.

That's because Mr. Boggs did not sell his namesake bills to art collectors. Instead, he would try to trade them for real goods or services. He didn't claim they were money, but did say that as works of art they had value he was willing to trade.

On social media this week, friends recalled a free spirit with a manic sense of humor worthy of Shakespeare's Puck.

"A brilliant madman," said multimedia artist Alicia Everett of Valatie, N.Y., who knew Mr. Boggs as a mentor when she worked on her bachelor's degree at the University of South Florida. "He was very, very ethical, very loyal even though he was not normative by any means. He definitely was a big part of my being accepted into a really good graduate program at the Art Institute of Chicago."

During a trip to Miami, friends once wrote an angry note on Mr. Boggs' hotel room door, said a friend, River Dakota Cutler of Tampa. He liked it and somehow persuaded the hotel to let him remove and keep the door.

Mr. Boggs made a last public appearance this month at a party in Tampa. After a high-energy discourse on art and money, Cutler said, he threw $100,000 in $100 bills — real ones — on the floor and encouraged guests to roll around in them.

"Every day was a performance for him," Cutler said.

Though he had homes in Hills­borough and Pinellas counties, Mr. Boggs was depressed after his mother died last year, Cutler said. It was not unheard of for him to check into a hotel and hang out.

Predeceased by both parents, Mr. Boggs had no siblings and no children relatives know of, said his cousin Jeff Keebler of Valrico. Funeral arrangements are pending.

Police were called to the hotel on N Dale Mabry Highway Sunday by someone who said Mr. Boggs had not been seen in some time. Hotel management told officers he had been staying at the Howard Johnson for about a month and a half, police spokesman Stephen Hegarty said. An officer wrote in an incident report that the room looked as if a hoarder lived there.

This probably should come as no surprise.

"I never throw anything out," Mr. Boggs once told Weschler, his biographer. "You should see my London studio."

To read the complete article, see:
Artist J.S.G. Boggs, known worldwide for his drawings of money, dies in Tampa at 62 (http://events.tbo.com/news/obituaries/artist-jsg-boggs-known-worldwide-for-his-drawings-of-money-dies-in-tampa/2310740)

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