We need some fresh faces!

Took the words right out of my mouth. :yes: As coingeez said up there, time to get a RedBook.

 

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I figured the Vegas lure might have set the hook. Back to the situation room....
Guy

 

He's waiting for it come in from England. He saved a whole $.20 buying it from a foreign source.

 

Well, I didn't know there was such a note. I could never afford that note that's for sure. LOL yes it would be a downgrade. In my opinion he sealed this country's fate when he had transferred ALL the monetary power to private banking interests. IMHO

 

:yes:

 

I believe there should simply be a law prohibiting any real person on a circulating coin or note. Let the artists come up with new designs portraying Lady Liberty. The greatest coins designs this country ever had were a direct result of the President removing mint staff from the process, and getting out greatests artistic designers to lay out new designs.

Can anyone name a beautiful design to come from the mint since draped bust coinage? Maybe capped bust, maybe. Nothing compares to early 20th century designs where the mint did not participate.

For notes, we used to have beautiful designs every few years. Are our engraving staff incapable to doing that again?

 

I am not sure if we have anymore artistc minds at the US mint,"$"money is the bottom line now not art.
Plus most of the new design are CAD/computer driven art,if you want call it art.

 

I imagine that, even if the SLQ was brought back in 1934, it wouldn't have lasted long after the Second World War. By the end of the 40s most abstract subjects were discontinued.

I'd like to see some mythology come back, though.

 

What is your definition of "art?" Does it have to be a certain age or have a certain collector demand? I feel sorry for those who over-glorify the past or under-appreciate the present. I consider the last dozen or so years to have the most creative and interesting designs in US history, plus having by far the most design changes. I'm glad and thankful to witness this era firsthand.
I earn a living and take pride in my CAD work. Does the use of modern technology diminish the end product?

 

I disagree with the original poster's premise. If this was 1998 I would agree that it was time for a change. What a lot of design changes we've had in the past 14 years! I like them all and I have a hard time keeping up to date. Think about the statehood series (56 reverse designs), the westward journey series (4 rev, 2 obv), the Lincoln bicentennial (5 rev), the NA dollar (4 rev so far), the president dollar (20 obv so far) and now the ATB quarters (11 rev so far). I can't count the PM's and Commem's from memory, but they are an interesting mix of classic and modern designs. Anybody aware of the magnitude of the Mint's product line? It would cost more than my annual salary to purchase one of everything. And you don't thing that's enough? Can't find something you like? That's like going into WalMart and saying the store isn't big enough.

 

While I agree that for quarters especially we have had tons of changes. I think the OP was objecting to having the same old dead presidents still be on our coins.

Regarding "art", it has nothing to do with age. It has to do with beauty. There was 1000 years of ugly uninspired coins which I am saying all US coins are superior to, so I would never say it has anything to do with age. Even within our own country's history, coins of the 20's are much more beautiful than coins 60 years older.

I am not saying a computer is incapable of creating a design that is beautiful, but most of their designs to date are horrible. I am not blaming the computer as much as the mint using computer design to minimize relief, committee art being used on coins, and a general lowest common denominator feel to the work. You tell me why coins nowadays do not look as good as in the past.

I would dare anyone to do a comparison study. I really would like to see the results. Take like 5 coins in BU, a modern Kennedy, a modern commemorative, an Oregon Trail half, a Walking liberty half, and a SL half. How many here believe that either modern coin would be judged the most beautiful? If our designs nowadays are so good, why does the mint continuously steal older designs when they want a good looking design for a bullion program?

 

Not to mention the idiocy of political correctness that had the Mint put a girl on the Boy Scouts commemorative dollar. It's sickening.

 

Laurel and Hardy, Gleason and Carney, Abbott and Costello, etc......we should start putting old comedy teams on money. Or maybe not. lol

 

I agree sir, personally I love high grade barbers and SL, but I know its my taste.

I do, however, strongly believe that both design and method of production was superior in the past than modern coins, and any "taste test" would easily reveal both coin collectors and the general public's taste is in general the same. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, yet we do know there are universal traits of attractiveness. I have no idea what design would win between a draped bust, capped bust, SL, barber, or WL half, but I am very willing to wager a WL or an Oregon Trail half would beat modern designs due to both design and method of manufacture.

Of course, I very well could be wrong.

Chris

 

The trouble with most modern US coins is manifold.
Two glaring problems:
They are designed by a committee - and that is generally a disasterous idea.
The artists apparently have no medallic art experience, consequently the designs, peurile to begin with, are downright hideous by the time they make it to coin form, appearing flat and featureless.

 

If there is a "huge problem" with who is on U.S. coinage, then who should be on the coins?

 

heres an idea. in 31 years, the U.S. will have had 1/4 millennium of circulating coinage, so the mint can commemorate the good old days of liberty coins by bringing them back. or they could do something like they did with the Lincoln cent, do a quarterly commemorative design of past U.S. coin designs, using different obverses and reverses, so the mint can profit, as it seems it always must.

 

I have to wonder how much harder the clad composition is than the old 90% silver composition.
We had beautiful coin designs not all that long ago - the walking liberty half, mercury dime, buffalo nickel and standing liberty quarter all circulated within my lifetime. And they didn't have the flat relief that modern design do.
The current circulating coins are by-and-large kinda ugly.