Zilkens' News Blog

Zilkens‘ News Blog 22 2024

Not long to go now - on the weekend before Art Basel, the European Parliament will be elected for the 10th time in Europe. In view of the growing threat from Russia and the imminent change in the world order, there is a lot at stake - but this is not reflected in the election campaign. Boring slogans that actually fit everywhere even without Europe characterise the picture. Culture is absent. Some candidates claim to come from the world of art - but their main profession is climate protection. This is probably a bit like being an art forwarding agent or an art expert. Anyone can hang a sign on their door and claim to be one. There are no clear criteria or publicly verifiable qualifications for this. The 34 parties competing for votes in Germany include the "Last Generation" and, starting with the student from what? who occupies the top spot in the list, all candidates are also climate activists. Interestingly, they are not gender-neutral. And what are the people from other parties who are also committed to climate protection doing now? Do they not exist now? Or are they second-class environmentalists? A number of pro-animal parties are also running. All of them are keen to get the votes that will enable them to get their expenses reimbursed or even a seat in parliament. There are no hurdles. Around 0.7% of the votes are enough for a seat. Meanwhile, someone in Moscow is fuming at Europe's external borders and is delighted that Sarah Wagenknecht, who is not even on the electoral lists of her alliance, is giving us the choice between peace and war. Let's hope that the election results will prove the pollsters wrong. Perhaps then the advertisement - for tolerance, respect and a more colourful world - attributed to the railway by the operators of the Miniature Wonderland in Hamburg will come true.

In the local elections in Thuringia, voters no longer seem to want the old faces. The SPD, Greens and FDP only just managed 17% in the district and city council elections - together, to put it mildly. The AfD, which has been categorised as right-wing extremist, at least as far as its state association in Thuringia is concerned, achieved almost as much support as the CDU with 27% (after two thirds of the votes counted). The big winners were the various other parties, which achieved almost 20% of the vote. Run-off elections for mayors and Lord Mayors are held together with the European elections one day before Art Basel on 9 June. Unfortunately, art and culture play no role in all these political intrigues and whether this would benefit museums, art associations, theatres and orchestras remains to be seen. The land of poets and thinkers has long since evolved into a place of envious people and dazzlers, where open discourse on solutions has given way to poisonous ideological jockeying.

AXA - a company of itself, in contrast to XL a company of her, in which the Group's art insurance activities are bundled, has decided that cyber risks can only be managed on a global level. The company (AXA) in Germany no longer serves customers with a turnover of more than 5 million with cyber insurance. This means keeping portfolios free of volatility. This does not necessarily mean anything for galleries and museums at present, as there are many providers who have not yet taken the step taken by AXA. However, many galleries and exhibition organisations are also dealing with the topic of cyber in a rather thick-skinned manner, according to the motto, what can happen? Christies had to postpone an auction for a day because the servers were unavailable and Olga Kronsteiner reports in Standard, that Galleries in Vienna had been affected - and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

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Yours, Stephan Zilkens and the team at Zilkens Fine Art Insurance Broker GmbH in Solothurn and Cologne