
An art dealer disappeared with $50M. 17 years later a documentary crew found him - jacquesm
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/day6/an-art-dealer-disappeared-with-50m-17-years-later-a-documentary-crew-found-him-1.5297422
======
eddhead
Isn't all of the global art marketplace, a swindle to begin with? It's a money
laundering industry in its entirely with almost barely any money actually
reaching the original artist. It could have easily been him selling something
he drew up in 2 days, make up a bullshit backstory, sell it for 50 million and
he'd actually not have to disappear

~~~
friendlybus
I repeatedly see a cynicism around art on HN and other tech blogs, does no-one
here see the inherent value in art or culture?

Jackson Pollock's art pieces get a lot of flack for basically having no
publicly presented interpretive structure, the artist came up with a technique
for doing 'plastic depth' that was a novel innovation. Irvine Kershner who
directed Empire Strikes Back and met Pollock made fun of him at the time for
his work appearing to be off the rails, and later came to appreciate it.

Taking out the market manipulation of fine art still leaves it with an
intrinsic value whether it is technique or the meaning imbued in having a
piece of work produced by an artist. Is that worth millions? Who knows, if I
give you any old guitar, and a guitar that Elvis played on I know the second
will be valued higher.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
I'm interested in art and culture.

Here's my favourite piece of art of all time, the Artemission bronze:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemision_Bronze](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemision_Bronze)

I guess, if you look at it from the wrong angle it looks just like a dude with
his feet planted apart, like he's about to take a shit. But, look closely and
you see that he's in full motion. His right leg is twisting behind his body.
The heel is raised and the toes are pushing down hard to put the full strength
of his body behind the throw. His left leg is pivoting on its heel. The toes
are pulled back as he turns his torso. He is leaning back, slightly to add his
weight to the power of his muscles. His left hand is extended in front of him,
so that he can swing it around like a pendulum, and add momentum to the throw.
He is throwing a weapon- and dancing at the same time.

This is a bronze statue so it was made to stand on its own two legs, without
any props to keep it upright. That is the biggest shock of all. A living,
breathing man would keep himself upright in the middle of this whirling move
by pulling on his mucles to maintain balance. And yet, here's a lifeless chunk
of bronze that has caught this man in the middle of all this pulling and
twisting and pushing, and dancing- and it's standing upright, balanced an
unfalling.

The artists who created this piece must have spent hours upon hours, days upon
days, studying the human form. They must have sat at the palaistra (the public
gym) observing the young men of Athens competing in javelin-throwing for ages.
Until they learned how the human body comes together, how it moves, how it
balances itself; how it _works_. Then they went off and transferred this
knowledge into bronze. And now, thousands of years later, any human can look
at the bronze and see what they learned.

This is what makes humans, human. To be able to look at the world and know,
and learn, and then put this knowledge into a form that can reach through time
and speak to other humans, and communicate this knowledge. To touch another
human's heart and mind through time and space, even after you're long gone. To
leave something behind that says "I lived, I learned, I created".

So, yeah, I see the value in art.

But modern art, like Jackson Pollock, that's a steaming hot pile of shit that
means nothing. There is no skill in it. There is no knowledge. No study. No
insight. There is no thought or emotion. There is just the cold hard glint of
gold in the eye of the so-called artist and those who sell his garbage on as
art to people who only understand the value of money, and have no other value
in life than money.

~~~
heavenlyblue
I see Pollock-like depth visuals every time I am incredibly hungover. So given
the context I had always associated them with this deep, wisely accepted
sadness which comes after realising your own mortality and limitations.

It's such an engineer's opinion, that life somehow owes you a clearly-defined
meaning and forms.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
Cheers, I'll take that as a compliment.

Before I studied computer science, in another life as they say, I studied art.
I took history of art courses and I was taught the official explanation for
Pollock's work, that it's really a study of human motion.

I bring up the Artemission bronze partly as a counterpoint. _That_ is a study
of human motion. Not what Pollock did.

There is real knowledge and understanding of the world that we can acquire.
Obviously not for everything. Obviously the world doesn't "owe" us anything.
But we can study, and work, and learn what there is to learn. Pollock did none
of that. He just moved his arms around and pretended to do it, like a magician
without magic, like a conductor without an orchestra.

Edit: it is Pollock's work that is cynical (referring to what the GP said).
Its premise is that nothing is really worth it. That you don't get anything
out of working hard to try and understand. So embrace your limitations and
wallow in the cheap and effortless, because you can never do better than that.

Well, that's -sorry for the easy point but- bollocks. You can do much better
than that. People have done much better than that for thousands of years.

~~~
heavenlyblue
>> So embrace your limitations and wallow in the cheap and effortless, because
you can never do better than that.

That’s not what I said. I said this is what kind of feelings it makes me
remember.

It doesn’t mean I think that life has to be cheap and effortless per se. Yet I
would appreciate art that reminds me of these feelings?

You are your typical art academician who having studied art now thinks they
know better than others. I don’t think you do.

Did you go for computer science because it pays better? So who’s truly cynical
here now? I went for computer science because I was good at it since the age
of 11. It’s my passion and I have a sense of respect for people who earned
their name in other industries, even if they did so not exactly through the
most straightforward methods.

You may say it’s bullshit. But so is Steve Jobs? After all, he died because he
didn’t do chemo at the right time, instead going for yoga.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
>> That’s not what I said.

To clarify, the sentence you quote referred to my interpretation of Pollock's
outlook, not to something you said.

I'm guessing you misunderstood my comment as a personal attack on you and you
chose to escalate? Otherwise I can't explain the sudden personal tone of your
comment. Did I cause confusion by using "you" and "yours" in the general
sense?

------
Enginerrrd
> I think the reason he felt safe in taking part in the documentary is because
> he is in a country where he is beyond the reach of U.S. law enforcement.

>And yet he doesn't have money ... so there's no point in anyone coming after
him because a civil suit wouldn't get them any money at all, and the FBI can't
get him because he's out of their reach.

Title conflicts with the statements in the article. Though IMO, there's
probably good reason to wonder if this claim is true.

------
justinclift
> There is a certain point in the film where there's a little flicker of
> remorse, but more than anything he feels that his actions were in some way
> justifiable.

One of my relatives is like that. :(

She'll lie, cheat, steal and generally screw over people. But pretend
innocence to the outside world, and come up with truly bizarre reasons to
justify things when asked by people who've realised what she's doing.

It's unfortunate, as it's so destructive. :(

------
fnord77
what countries out outside the reach of interpol / US extradition for this
type of crime? Guessing he's still in South America someplace.

~~~
sailfast
Yeah - my money would be in Venezuela or Cuba.

~~~
rmason
Venezuela makes the most sense since he could simply walk over the border from
Brazil. Guyana might be another possibility as well which would have the added
advantage of English being the national language. John McAfee famously lived
in Guyana.

~~~
mirimir
I wonder if Snowden could have been OK in Cuba, Guyana or Venezuela.

~~~
sebastiangraef
Probably way higher chance of just getting abducted.

------
findyoucef
how can i watch this?

~~~
kristofferR
It's available the places BBC content is available, except iPlayer.

It's so damn dumb to force people to seek pirate sources by not providing
legal options.

~~~
samstave
Which is where?

~~~
db48x
You could sail to the bay of pirates. There are many merchants there with
goods from far-off places; mayhap you will find what you seek.

------
abstrct
Gerald Cotten next maybe?

