Banknotes are supposed to represent a country, a philosophy or “political heroes”. But most of all, their monetary value obviously means a lot - well, at least to the some. 

Italian artist Alessandro Rabatti’s “Facebank” series reworks selected parts of the U.S dollar bill, British pound sterling and Yuan banknotes by adding details that reflect on iconic super heroes. He is reminding everyone who and what is on “our cash”, which is actually not "ours" since it stays public property. A similar idea Greek artist Stefanos touched recently (check Lodown #96).

Rabatti’s banknotes and the implied heroes & villains topic obviously loves to play around with being a paradox, as they show that ‘ironically they are perceived to be the only possible saviours who could save us out of the crisis.’

Thus, the Joker, Catwoman and Iron Man are a few of the comic book figures reworked onto the images of presidents and royals, with colourful gold imagery and motifs creating a bold composition for each. The series aims to give a face to the idea of power, one that is more and more characterized by a disarming loss of faith from the general public. With this series the artist likes to reflect on the value of money and incite a discussion about the current economic crisis.