Q&A: Paul Rousso Debuts Big Money Collection at Avant Gallery

Photography by Samuel Rivas on June 3rd, 2021 in Arts, Editorials, Lifestyle

Paul Rousso

Aventura, FL – June 3, 2021 – Paul Rousso is an American-born visual artist and innovator who was born in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1958. He began his formal training at the Cleveland Institute of Art in Ohio, and later moved to New York to continue his career. Once in New York, Rousso joined an interior design team and found himself drawing plans for the home of Robert De Niro. Rousso finished his BFA in 1981 at the California College of Arts in Oakland before becoming a successful art director and illustrator for brands such as Revlon, Clairol, Condé Nast, and Bloomingdales. Today, Rousso works full-time as an artist from his studio in Charlotte.

Rousso’s signature works are large-scale sculptures of everyday objects, using scale to emphasize wrappers and ephemera that might otherwise be overlooked. By confronting viewers with these whimsically massive objects, Rousso underscores their importance as reflections of our society. Rousso’s work is held in private collections over North America, Europe, the Middle East and beyond including Avant Gallery, and numerous public projects of his appear across the United States. He has shown at Art New York, Art Palm Beach, and Art Miami as well as Scope Miami, Scope New York, and Scope Basel.

On Thursday, June 3rd, Avant Gallery and Haute Living presented renowned artist Paul Rousso’s Big Money Collection exhibition opening with an exclusive meet-and-greet cocktail event at Aventura Mall. Guests toured the art-fair inspired gallery and celebrated the new exhibition while sipping on The Pale and La Scolca Black Label wines. World Red Eye caught up with Paul Rousso at the opening event for his newest exhibition and discussed how the Big Money Collection came to be and the future of currencies themselves. Read the full Q&A below.

Paul Rousso

WRE: Tell us about your relationship with Avant Gallery and your exhibition opening event.

Paul Rousso: Our relationship is what one would call a new relationship. Like many new relationships it is surrounded in a veil of wonderful perfection. I feel as if I have finally found a gallery owner, Dmitry Prut, whose energy level matches my own. My opening event was great because everyone invited seemed to truly appreciate my work. I’ve never felt more at ease at an opening event.

WRE: What was your inspiration behind the Big Money Collection?

PR: My life’s work has been about making the two-dimensional, three-dimensional. This has taken many forms and multiple variations over my career. When I finally discovered how to make a giant crumpled piece of paper with printed imagery on it, I wanted to reimagine the most ubiquitous, most important printed matter of all: money.

Paul Rousso

I wanted to reimagine the most ubiquitous, most important printed matter of all: money.

Paul Rousso

Paul Rousso

WRE: Currency, whether digital or paper, is a huge trending topic at the moment, but has been a recurring theme in your work for years. How has the current conversation impacted your more recent work?

PR: One of the most cerebral aspects of my work is that it shines a light on this most common of two-dimensional subject matter – currency – and the impending disappearance thereof. I’ve been saying it for years – one day there will be no more physical money, only the zeros and ones that constitute your bank account. With the emergence of cryptocurrency and NFTs, it is happening faster than I ever thought. I’ve only recently created my first NFTs.

WRE: What do you hope people will take away from your work on display at Avant Gallery?

PR: So many artists attempt to layer their work in poetic meaning and symbolism. My work is much simpler than that. There is no poetic meaning or symbolism. My work merely is what it attempts to be, albeit at greater proportions. You don’t need a Masters in Fine Art to appreciate my work. It’s accessible to all.

Dmitry Prut & Paul Rousso

I feel as if I have finally found a gallery owner, Dmitry Prut, whose energy level matches my own.

Paul Rousso

Dmitry Prut & Paul Rousso

WRE: Tell us about your “Flat Depth” concept in relation to the Big Money Collection.

PR: “Flat Depth” is a concept I came up with as a 19-year-old student after seeing a seminal art show of all my Pop Art fathers at the Berkeley Art Museum. The concept encompasses many forms of subject matter, but few more relevant than the future disappearance of physical currency.

WRE: What can we expect from you next?

PR: For the past three years I have been focusing on new work that will be premiered this year at Art Miami with Avant Gallery. It will be the perfect definition of the term “Flat Depth”. It will speak to all people, provided they grew up on Planet Earth. Stay tuned!