As IF Times

link Investors renew passion for modern masters | Art and design | The Observer.

Talk about expensive porn collection.  Mind you Modigliani isn’t exactly run of the mill Guccione, so one can probably justify the slight premium over the Penthouse stuff.  Actually, the portrait is rather demure given what passes as pulchritude these days.

As an explanation of the almost $69 million dollar price tag, not including taxes, a spokesman for Sotheby’s said:

“…It was a great night for Modigliani… that price represents over four times the price realised when it was sold at Sotheby’s in 1999,” a spokesman for the auction house said. Gerlis said she was not surprised by the new record, since no Modigliani nude had come under the hammer for seven years. “Nudes always sell well anyway, and this was a very pretty, almond-eyed lady,” she said…”

There you go.  Nudity sells, we know that of course, but pretty and almond eyed were the definitive features that commanded such “gotta have itness”.   Notice the portrait did not feature out sized bosoms or intricate tattoos, the hallmarks of beauty in today’s pop culture.  This art sale may inspire women to go for the pretty, almond eyed look if only to enhance perception of value.

Of course, I’m the first to admit ignorance of the numismatic value of art or any appreciation of it whatsoever  beyond the banal observation of whether I like it or not.  As well, it’s hard to cast aspersions on anyone’s sanity if they choose to pay up to acquire some ‘valuable’ artifact like a baseball card or piece of pottery.  In the case of rare works of art like the piece described here, that is not what’s at play.  The purchase is made solely as an investment and considered to be a safe one at that.  In the case of another old master, Henri Matisse, his works are characterized thusly:

“…a large bronze sculpture of a woman’s back by Matisse sold at Christie’s in New York for just under $49m (£30.2m), setting a new record for the French impressionist. “Matisse is a brand, and so is seen as safe,” said Gerlis. “It is much more likely to hold its value than some crumpled piece of paper by the latest popular new artist to catch someone’s eye…”

Safe! $49 or $69 million dollars spent on a piece of canvas with oil on it or bronze sculpture  is considered safe!!  Not real estate, not gold, not an ongoing business, but a one off piece of artwork!  I’m not sure whether that says more about the shrewdness of the buyer or the relative stability of the world’s economies.  This surely implies that compared to government bonds and securities, La Belle Romaine is a safer bet for preservation of capital.  While we don’t know who the buyer is and in fact it may be an investment fund looking to decrease covariance in its holdings, at $69 million dollars, there had better be someone expected to pay much more than that down the road to achieve any kind of return.  Otherwise, it’ll just be another bauble  hanging in the foyer.  But if investors at this level eschew all investments in favor of rare art, we may all be in trouble.

link UN calls for higher taxes to combat climate warning.

In the classic 1976 horror/suspense teen movie Carrie, an otherwise improbable story is made even more ludicrous when at the end, a hand reaches out from the grave and grasps at the heroine, just when everyone thought the story was over.

The slight ebb in the stupidity which is global warming seems to be making a zombie like comeback a la Carrie.  The U.N. which itself is a parasitic leech on nations is calling for another 100 billion dollars or so of taxes in order to fund the fairy tale.  While a hundred billion dollars may not be as much as a year ago  before the devaluation of the dollar, it’s still a lot of hooch to throw down the bottomless pit of global warming initiatives.  If we spent that towards let’s say, global hunger, I might buy it.

It’s not good enough that the west is abstaining from personal washing, re-using shopping bags, driving electric skateboard-like deathtraps and recycling eggshells.  Only through imposition of taxes can the imminent destruction of earth be avoided.   More research is needed to find the root causes and find ‘sustainable solutions’.  In point of fact, they will determine that since man (especially western man) is the root cause of warming, they must be eliminated or reduced.  They have to eliminate man to save man.  Hmmm.  More than enough evidence has emerged which pushes back at  the credibility of the doomsday claims of the movement that sane rational people should at least be skeptical of the ongoing bleating. 

My suspicions are that the movement is being funded by the travel and hospitality industries which have much to gain from ongoing conferences in exotic locales.  If someone decided to tally up the benefits to airlines, taxis, limos, hotels and bars which service this industry, I”m sure we’d understand the need to keep the debate alive.  To say nothing of the millions of chickens sacrificed as dinner for these earnest conventioneers.  Next thing you know, someone will link the decline of the chicken population to global warming.  That would be hard to argue.  Naturally, that would be a government funded study.  Please let the Zombie die already.