Coin Gold

George Herms
Coin Gold
Mixed media assemblage, c. 1962
38 x 36 x 9 inches
Gift of Diana Zlotnick, Los Angeles, California
1991.210

Coin Gold (1962) was first exhibited at Aura Gallery in Pasadena. Writer Edward Leffingwell points out that Aura Gallery was a seminal artist-run venue that was visited by Walter Hopps, Irving Blum, and other important figures at the time. Coin Gold is an assemblage of mostly everyday objects: wood panel, paper, a title card on which “Coin Gold” is written, and an embroidery of small flowers . The embroidery hangs out of a metal cone with yellows that pick up the yellow in the title card. Toward the bottom is an enlarged Roman coin that appears to have oxidized over time. The temporal materials used in the entirety of the piece juxtapose with the appearance of its permanence as a whole, exemplified by the way that the soiled paper takes on the weight of bronze with varying patinas.