Do you detest the rich?
Do you fret over evil elitists plotting over their Dom Perignon and caviar how to draft us all into their mammoth proletarian slave camps?
Wall Street titans and wealthy oligarchs may indeed be scheming 24/7 on how to amass the world's goods, while protecting them with political favors – but haters of the 1% are forgetting something crucial; actually, a multitude of things.
Beastly rich patrons are a necessity of life and have been for centuries. Face it, art and culture may not die without them, but would suffer sadly should they cease to exist. Silver-spooned benefactors paid to build and fund a substantial chunk of what was once referred to as "civilization." I understand the term is "politically suspect" and in some repute, but bear with me here. Civilization (often) gives rise to universities, auditoriums, soaring sites of worship, state houses, libraries, working toilets and, among other things, museums.
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Most grand houses of art weren't birthed by the "people" or even taxpayer initiative. Starving dilettantes never gathered in mobs demanding "give me museums or give me death!" Not on this planet, where we're stuck in coils of mortal flesh and tragically occupied with Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Only the well-coiffed, well fed and fairly secure embark on building museums and impressive streaks of public works which often bear their names.
Sundry tycoons bequeathed their personal collections as well as vast sums to found public art spaces in America. Among them were robber barons, cotton lords, industrialists and many heirs to the former's fortunes. Isabella and Solomon Guggenheim inherited the world's largest smelting and mining empire and extended that into acres of art collections. Carnegie's steel helped raise countless exhibition halls, and Standard Oil paved the way for the Rockefeller's largesse toward the arts. Contemporary patron/gallerist Charles Saatchi made his initial fortune in advertising to fund his real interest.
Most of the world's grandest art museums were once homes of regents – the Louvre, the Hermitage, Nara Castle in Japan and the Forbidden City in Beijing. There are hundreds. They belong as well to the masses who built them involuntarily through heavy taxation and, at times, slavery. Even entrenched leftists might agree that wealthy donors are a better deal than that.
Greece is in dire need of ultra philanthropically-inclined shipping magnates to charge to their rescue, for this very purpose. Their imminent economic implosion is threatening to bury chances for public participation in the arts, and possibly shake the European economy. And this is a great shame, considering Greece is the womb of Western art and civilization, which some people still believe was a rather good idea.
Reacting to years of drastic shortfalls since 2008, museums are closing, shuttered or in hibernation, trying to ride out the chaos. They choose between opening doors, laying off staff or having electricity. Some houses of art are merging corporation-style to stay afloat, and the opening of a new contemporary art museum in Athens is indefinitely delayed. It's enough to drive artists and directors to their knees, which would be a wonder to behold. Contemporary artists haven't sought divine help nearly as much as their ancestors invoked the goddess Athena and the Muses.
Can at least part of the misery of the Greek art scene be laid at feet of AWOL philanthropists? Andreas Dracopoulos, Greek shipping scion thinks so. "I'm very upset with this class of people," he informed Time Magazine in a July 2015 interview. An heir to the Starvos Niarchos fortune, Dracopoulos is almost contemptuous of his fellows, their behavior, sloth and lack of civic interest and fortitude. "They don't do philanthropy, they don't pay taxes, and they don't start businesses," he charges of even his own family members. Perhaps that's why he generally lives in New York City. Dracopoulos and his wife are involved in philanthropic endeavors there and also for Greece.
Apparently the extra-dutiful Dracopoulos is somewhat loathed by his loaded boardroom buddies and cousins in wealth. Rather than opening new theatres or helping the poor, they occupy themselves with other things, such as parties and more parties. Heirs Paris Latsis and Stavros Niarchos III regularly appear in scandal sheets over fortnightly flings with some pop star or other.
Patriarch Aristotle Onassis did have an eternal affair with Maria Callas, but at least he was generous, creating the Onassis Foundation with offshoots still functioning across the earth (rivaling the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, named for Onassis' competitor in business and good works).
Young privileged Greeks haven't received the accolades for business or philanthropy that Dracopoulos has, because most haven't earned it – at least so far. Apparently rich Greeks no longer believe in the ancient European tradition of "noblesse oblige," which can be interpreted as either caring for your fellow man or avoiding the evil eye.
Athina Onassis, last remaining heiress of the Onassis empire, is rumored to have enough stashed away to cancel Greece's $352.7 billion debt. This is likely highly exaggerated. Still, a coterie of Greek oligarchs would be welcome to plot away if they could aid their nation and its culture. Onassis sold Skorpios, her grandfather's private island paradise, to Ekaterina Rybolovleva, daughter of yet another oligarch – Russian this time. What if they used Skorpios to house and comfort Christian refugees, the ones no one has welcomed yet? It would be a different world.
Our Colonies were built on philanthropy and personal sacrifice from the beginning. We attracted singular, selfless men – or perhaps God sent them to us. Polish Jew Haym Salomon was an immigrant to the colonies who offered himself utterly to his newly adopted land. Haym bankrolled the Revolution and brokered deals for loans overseas. He spied and was imprisoned for us.
America is still a land of philanthropists, related to our strong Judeo-Christian flooring of alms, the Golden Rule and so on. This subliminally effects even the most jaded, anti-religious of the 1%, but they can always ignore their conscience. More are doing so all the time, exacerbating divides between rich and poor and feeding Marxist hype (which is with us always.)
Evidence that Judeo-Christian beliefs foster the arts is the sheer number of museums founded in homes or halls, and paid by individuals in the West – Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, London's Leighton House, New York's Morgan Library and dozens of others.
Compare this to Turkey's sole, privately-funded museum from a residence, which only opened in 1980. The Sadberk Hanim Museum was made to showcase the private collection of Sadberk Koç.
Possibly the first Chinese privately-funded museum (non-Imperial and open for public) was the Chefoo Museum. Presbyterian missionary Hunter Corbett created it in 1876 to drum up interest in the faith. According to researcher Tracey L-D Lu, Chefoo featured rare antiquities, curiosities, minerals, plants and wildlife.
Greece is feeling the effects of "post-Christianity" even if they haven't officially declared themselves excommunicated. They elected an atheist as their new prime minister this year. Alexis Tsipras did something no other Greek statesman has ever done: he refused to swear the traditional Greek oath of office. Referring to the Holy Trinity and the Bible, it involves the use of holy water, crucifixes and sometimes sprigs of basil – all related to Orthodox Church theology.
Is electing an atheist directly related to Greece's current state of affairs? Probably not, since their troubles began long ago; but it may affect the future of Greece without an official bailout by God.
Artists should take note, because the twain may be more intimately related than we think.
Sources
- Gareth Harris, The Art Newspaper
- Daniel Engber, Slate
- Simon Shuster, Time
- Erasmus, The Economist
- Tracey L-D Lu, "Museums in China: Power, Politics and Identities," Routledge 2014