#2 Bill Drummond, How to be an Artist

1 - 19 December 2004

In 1970, at the age of 17, Bill Drummond tried to walk across Iceland and failed. 

In 1994 Richard Long walked across Iceland, from top to bottom. On this walk he made art. 

In 1995 Bill Drummond bought a work of art by his favourite living artist, Richard Long, for $20,000. It was a photography and text work called A Smell Of Sulphur In The Wind. This work of art documented a stone circle made by the artist on his walk across Iceland. Bill Drummond hung the work on his bedroom wall and was very pleased. 

In 1998 , Drummond realized he no longer had an ongoing relationship with the work. In response to this realization he decided to sell it for the original $20,000; take the money in one dollar bills to Iceland; start walking from the top of the island to the bottom; stop off at what remained of the stone circle made by Richard Long; bury the $20,000 at the center of the circle; take a photograph of the enriched circle; complete the walk across Iceland leaving behind the 20,000 dollars to their destiny. 

Back in Britain, he would develop and print his photograph; mount and frame it identically to the Richard Long; title it A Smell of Money Underground; hang it on his bedroom wall and then hope that his relationship with the art work would be restored. In 2001, he had not as yet sold the work but decided to grid it up into 20,000 equal size rectangles and sell them off at a dollar a throw. 

The process of selling it off began in May 2002. It will take some years before all the fractions have been sold and he is able to return to Iceland with the $20,000; have A Smell Of Money Underground hanging on his bedroom wall and his relationship with the art restored.