Artist says he will destroy $45 million worth of Rembrandt, Picasso and Warhol masterpieces with acid if Julian Assange dies in prison
Artist says he will destroy $45 million worth of Rembrandt, Picasso and Warhol masterpieces with acid if Julian Assange dies in prison
"In our catastrophic time - when we have so many wars - to destroy art is much more taboo than to destroy the life of a person," Andrei Molodkin says.
Ok.
I mean, it sucks to see art destroyed, but I guess if you bought it, you can destroy it.
If that upsets you, then maybe we should reconsider allowing art to fall into the hands of wealthy collectors. If it should be preserved for future art lovers and historians, then to quote a great philosopher of our time, "It belongs in a museum."
I don't know what it has to do with Assange.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ it's not in the public sphere but your private collection, so you do you chap.
In my opinion privately owned art of a high enough cultural value should either not be allowed to be privately owned, or if it is then it should have to be on permanent loan to free admission public galleries. But that's not the case.
Warhol would probably approve of this, tbh
Oh no!
So anyway…
That's a weird reason to give for it, like it's obviously not going to change anything. The Justice system isn't going to be held up by an artist threatening to destroy some paintings (and it could be years before Assange ever dies in prison), it seems like it's being done as performance art. Pretty much like Banksy trying to destroy one of his works right after it was sold at auction, it's being done for the attention/message of the act itself.
If there is more of a taboo around destroying art over human lives, it's not for the sake of the "Art" itself, it's for the sake of the arbitrary, yet quantitative value of money that those works have attached to them, because of how ridiculously inflated the price of artwork is (for money laundering purposes or whatever financial hijinks the wealthy are using artwork for). The historical value to humanity probably plays into it as well, but that's not nearly as big a consideration. Otherwise though, you've got governments like the Taliban which will happily destroy history just as easily as they'll kill people, that's the kind of society we could have where art is given equal weight to human life.
Meanwhile, the people that our society deems worthy of death are people who don't really have much income or wealth to their name. If you looked at the average wealth of individuals on death row or who have been executed in the US, it's likely to be lower than the wealth of average Americans. So Art is valued more than human lives because, quantitatively, some pieces of art are probably worth more than some people would make in a lifetime.
cool film it
I think a lot of us only roughly remember the details (or didn't follow the later revelations) about Assange. My memory was weak, too, so here is a short refresher (with links!)
Pre 2015 Wikileaks did ethical releases of leaked information (vouched; cleaned of names and details that would expose individuals to danger) and exposed generally diplomatic and military-industrial dirt.
Trump Campaign Assange and thus Wikileaks sided with the GOP. Wikileaks had a line to Trump's campaign team. They also sat on a trove of DNC E-Mails provided by Russian hackers. Wikileaks timed releases to blot out news that could hurt Trump. In one case, the Trump campaign urgently asked for a leak and got Wikileaks to act within 30 minutes. Wikileaks also refused to publish leaks harming Russia.
From the private chat logs (more in the Business Insider article linekd above), some things Assange said to his, until then, progressive aides
Assange: "We believe it would be much better for GOP to win. Dems+Media+liberals woudl [sic] then form a block to reign in their worst qualities."
Assange: "Russia is absolutely terrified. Kalingrad, Crimea, and its only foreign naval base, Syria are all under threat and are not protected by Russia’s strategic depth. Meanwhile the US hacks the hell out of it"
It looks to me like Assange got suckered in by Russian propaganda rather than sell out intentionally, but that's just my own guess.
Rape Charges In Sweden, he used his fame to obtain sex from two women, both times trying to refuse condoms. He was creepy and pushy with both. Woman A suspected he manipulated his condom. Woman B woke up in the night to find Assange had climbed on top of her for "second servings" without asking and had penetrated her without a condom.
From my own memory: neither woman went to the police, but when they talked about it (to press?), a public prosecutor in Sweden was duty-bound to start a rape investigation.
It gets too messy from there. The US had an interest in Assange's extradition and may have plausibly exerted pressure. The women received threats and hate. Russia fanned the flames under everything to fuel division and turn more Wikileaks supporters against the US.
The rest is history. I don't know where to stand. Assange and Wikileaks were once forces for good. But, in my opinion, he got played, never realized or never admitted to it, and is now just another lackey aiding Russia.
If these art pieces are in a private collection that can't be enjoyed by everyone already: Was anything of value to culture really lost? 🤔
Would the very fact that destroying them would be meaningful, as well as publicly documented, be more artisticly valuable than keeping the artwork locked up in a vault?
Sorry, we don't negotiate with performance art terrorists.
This is a thought-provoking stunt. There's a desire to get upset about the deliberate destruction of art, but getting mad about what it would mean if the art was destroyed is directly tied to a world where Julian Assange dies in state custody, and it makes little sense to care about 16 paintings more than a human life, or the implication that we are not free to speak out against authority.
Based move. Art is only good if it says something. This art says something.
Based
As long as the US has the Hague invasion act along with some of the most inhumane sentences and prisons no country should extradite a non US citizen there. I'm pretty sure the only crime he committed was in Sweden anyways so they should have him.
Personally, the Rembrandts get to me because I hate seeing old things destroyed :(
At least this guy is being creative
Do this instead: sell those works, or maybe half of them, and give the money to Genocide Joe to bribe him to pardon Assange. Hell, if he lives long enough to see Trump elected, it would probably only cost half of that.
Well... bye.