Artist Got $84,000 From Museum, Gave Empty Canvases With Mocking Title

• A Danish conceptual artist pocketed $84,000 loaned to him by a gallery to re-make an artwork.
• Instead of using the cash as agreed, he sent empty frames titled “Take the Money and Run.”
• He will be in breach of contract if he does not return the money, the museum director told Insider.

A Danish conceptual artist pocketed $84,000 loaned to him by a museum to make artworks, handing in blank canvases titled “Take the Money and Run.”

The agreement was for Jens Haaning to re-make versions of two earlier works in the Kunsten museum in Aalborg, Denmark.

Originals were made from cash and displayed in Danish Krone and Euro banknotes. The originals were placed in a frame that represented the combined annual income of Austrian and Danish citizens. Their total value was around $84,000.

(Insider couldn’t find the exact breakdown of these figures or their sources.

Insider spoke to Lasse Andersson who is the director of Kunsten, Aalborg, Denmark. He said that Jens Haiing could be in breach if he doesn’t return the money. This was material for the art and not a payment.

Instead, Haaning sent two empty frames to the museum and stated that he was making a new work.

That email is now displayed along with the empty canvases in the group exhibition “Work It Out,” which opened on September 23.

The agreement had been that Haaning would return the money on January 16, 2022, Andersson told Insider. But Haaning told CNN that he has no intention of returning it.

Hetold The Guardian that it was a protest against low pay.

The newspaper reports that he was charged a fee by the museum for the right to be featured in the artwork. This is approximately $3,900. CNN reported that he said the fee would still leave him without a pocket.

“The work is that I have taken their money,” The Guardian reported Haaning saying this to Danish radio. “It’s not theft. It is breach of contract, and breach of contract is part of the work.”

Andersson said that the museum is proud to pay reasonable artist fees.

Insider reported that he was ready to pursue legal action to recover the money if Haaning does indeed keep it. However, he said that he was not surprised.

“I’m difficult to shock,” he said, adding: “When I phoned Jens Thursday evening last week, I said that he shocked my curatorial staff and he made me laugh.”

Andersson may be sanguine, but he said his curators were deeply upset — and the work has garnered international headlines. He said the museum is “not wealthy” and that he takes any misuse of public and private money seriously.

“There have been a lot of people saying that I’m a naive director and it’s a misuse of public and private money,” He stated.

Despite the disruption to their agreement, he defended the work artistically, saying: “We need the uncontrolled and the unforeseen and the unknown to re-establish ourselves as human beings in relation to society.”

He noted that Haaning’s stunt has raised a huge discussion, but compared the sums involved to the scandal of massive Chinese property company Evergrande, which is currently seeking a government bailout for its more than $300 billion of debt.

Haaning has shown extensively at biennials like those in Gwangju, South Korea and Istanbul, Turkey.

Andersson was asked if he would ever work again with Haaning. “If he returns the money.”