Paul Rousso

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About the artwork

Paul Rousso's "Money Bloom" is a captivating sculpture that challenges our perceptions of value and materialism through its playful yet provocative form. At first glance, the artwork appears to be a chaotic pile of crumpled global currencies, from vibrant pesos to crisp dollars, rendered in striking detail. However, Rousso masterfully transforms these seemingly discarded bills into a meticulously crafted, three-dimensional "bloom" using his signature technique of thermoforming printed materials. The piece is both a technical marvel and a commentary on consumer culture, elevating the mundane and often transient nature of currency into a permanent, almost botanical, art object. It invites viewers to consider the beauty and allure of money, while simultaneously questioning its true significance and the ephemeral nature of wealth in a world obsessed with accumulation.

About the artist

American artist Paul Rousso transforms the fleeting into the monumental. Renowned for his hyperreal, oversized sculptures of crumpled currency, candy wrappers, newspapers, and glossy magazine pages, Rousso interrogates our relationship with media, materialism, and memory. His works playfully immortalize what is typically tossed aside—objects meant to be consumed and forgotten—elevating them into timeless icons of contemporary culture. Rousso’s practice draws from a diverse background in scenic design, digital manipulation, and commercial art direction, all of which converge in his meticulously crafted sculptures.

Through a proprietary process of heat infusion on plexiglass and other materials, he sculpts paper-thin forms that mimic real-life textures with startling accuracy. The result is artwork that is both technically impressive and conceptually resonant—wrinkled banknotes and discarded ads become touchpoints for nostalgia, identity, and cultural commentary. Influenced by Pop Art masters like Lichtenstein and Warhol, as well as the fantastical stylings of Dr. Seuss, Rousso infuses his work with wit, color, and scale. But beneath the playful surface lies a quiet urgency: a meditation on the impermanence of media in a world where physical print is vanishing.

By preserving these ephemeral artifacts in larger-than-life form, he invites viewers to pause, reflect, and consider what we value—and what we throw away.