Zilkens' News Blog

Zilkens' News Blog 12 2022

"My peace is gone" says Gretchen in Faust and later, slightly modified, "Putin, I am in fear of you", thus describing the emotional state of 99.9% of the free world, which had not thought that what happened on 24 February 2022 was possible. No one wanted to listen to the 0.1% admonishers and warners, because what cannot be cannot be. But now it is, and we are witnessing a Ukrainian president who wields the sword of freedom with words because there are hardly any defensive weapons in his country, a population that is heroically standing up to the Ursurpator and occupier, and a German chancellor who is more of a swaggerer than a governor. The Greens are trying to get used to the idea that nuclear power can perhaps do both: Supply energy and save CO2. But instead of using it, the chancellor does not dare to get out of the hole his predecessors of all sexes have put him in with a trusting energy policy towards Russia. There is only one way to stop Putin and his entourage: No more gas, no more coal and no more oil from Russia - that could make a difference - there's no money in it, even in totalitarian states. Putin's 17-20 year old fighters come from Kamchatka and other distant regions of the giant empire because they have spent their lives so far only with ego shooters and certainly not with relatives in Ukraine. There, they press the button with fewer scruples and destroy people and cultural assets. And the Russian Orthodox Church? It owes its resurgence to the strategy of a man who doesn't care about human lives and blesses his atrocities. Ugh.

Victor Pinchuk has made it clear in the Wall Street Journal that warm words are not enough to defend freedom. Under the headline Ukraine Needs More Than Sympathy From the West to Beat Russia, it is clear in a few sentences why. This time we should give more credence to the 0.1% who warn that the flawless democrat (quote from a mammon-loving narcissist and aggressor friend) will not be satisfied with its conquest.

On Friday, Eigen und Art will open an exhibition in Leipzig with works by Lada Nakonechnaya, a Ukrainian artist who also contributed a motif for an art insurance talk. It was the 7th : Gurlitt, Stern, Flechtheim - who insures history for me? And who insures damage caused by war? No one any more where it is waged. On sea and air transport outside on the usual terms with two days' cancellation notice.

The CINOA has called for a review of the policy position on money laundering through the art trade. In most studies, false analyses are merely repeated - freely according to the motto: I make politics with the statistics that I myself have falsified. For example, the rumour persists that 10 billion dollars are laundered annually in the art trade, although this has long been disproven. But this is just as ineradicable as the crime novel plot with the maniac collecting in secret. Since the Art Loss Register and the Interpol App, this is no longer a profitable business model, worldwide!

In Vienna, SPARK will take place from Thursday with 80 galleries and a corresponding number of artists. What does Spark mean when you break down the letters? Hopefully not Sparkasse, that tastes kind of stuffy and no one who is dedicated to the true, the good, the beautiful wants to get that smell. (How about Spar Preise Auf Richtige Kunst? - if that were the case, the galleries would look forward to a lively reception.)

Have a week full of hope for the good in people and leaders of all sexes.

Yours sincerely, Stephan Zilkens and the team of Zilkens Fine Art Insurance Broker GmbH in Solothurn and Cologne.