Chapter 382 The Moon and Six Million Pounds

"Whoever becomes the next famous realist watercolorist after the war will get the ownership of this painting. It sounds like an interesting agreement. It is worth a lot of money."

Gu Weijing commented.

For reasons such as tax avoidance and asset preservation.

In-kind exchanges are conducted privately between art collections and pawn shop transactions, or physical objects are given as gifts.

It is illegal to do this in some states in the United States, but it is not uncommon in continental Europe or private operations among collector groups.

Menzel and Castiglione are similar in that they are both artists whose vast majority of collections are collected by national sovereign galleries and have been passed down in an orderly manner.

The main collection of the Old National Gallery on Museum Island is Menzel's paintings, and it is also known as "Menzel's Museum".

This kind of collection of court painters living abroad is very small, and each one is expensive.

If it is indeed the same as his guess.

This is indeed a very generous arts sponsorship.

Painters go crazy for art exhibitions, certainly because participating in art exhibitions can bring very rich material gains.

However, this kind of gain mainly comes from the increase in net worth and the nature of painting sales and transactions of the art exhibition itself. It is not the bonus from the art exhibition that has such appeal.

The prize money given to the winners by most developments is not much.

$50,000 is already high.

Especially for certain exhibitions and art salons with a long history, the prize money will only be adjusted every many years.

When it was established in 1900, the maximum bonus awarded to the winner by the organizing committee was around US$2,500.

If I saved a little money back then, I could really buy a sailing yacht and travel around the world.

Up to now, I can’t even afford a better Apple laptop.

In the past half century, the appreciation rate of art has been much faster than the depreciation rate of currency inflation.

Gu Weijing didn't know the size of the Berlin Palace.

If you think about the value of a Rolls-Royce in the 1940s, no matter how conservative it is today, two new Rolls-Royces should be available.

The most valuable watercolor master today, even if he has won all the major awards such as Turner, Venice Watercolor Festival, Detailed Watercolor Award, and Barcelona Watercolor Award, he would never dare to say that one of his watercolor paintings can be It's more valuable than Mencier's.

This is one of the most generous rewards in the art world.

It’s just that

Gu Weijing is a little curious.

Bets with stakes of this magnitude are no child’s play.

So how do these two art masters call themselves masters of realistic watercolor painting

What is considered “realistic” and what is considered “famous”

Even though the post-war art landscape is, as President Miller said, more and more inclined towards virtual reality, and more and more emphasis on creative form rather thanPainting techniques.

But watercolor is, after all, a very popular mainstream painting method.

A well-known painter who specializes in realism can casually name ten or eight names without any difficulty.

Gu Weijing has never heard of it. A certain art media reported that this big pie hit the head of a lucky watercolor painter.

It was even today that he heard about this bet for the first time.

Strange

It should be in line with common sense that such a big reward should be under the spotlight of the media all day long.

"If this bet is only half as good as this, it must be one of the most talked about art awards today. Gu, the reason why only very few local Hamburg artists have heard of this bet. Not Because the bet is not big enough, but it is too big, a bit too big."

"It's too big"

Gu Weijing's eyebrows blinked. one time.

It was hard for him to imagine.

What kind of bet will make the management of Oil Painting Magazine and kih feel headaches now? The Berlin Palace most likely does not have such qualifications.

Menzel's works are certainly an excellent collection of art.

Don’t talk about technique but value.

Menzel’s level of attention is at best as different as that of Reano, worse than Monet and Turner, let alone Leonardo da Vinci or Van Gogh.

It’s just a landscape painting, not the Mona Lisa.

It should be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars at auction.

For ordinary people, it is a huge sum of money, but it does not matter whether it is an old-money wealthy family like the Elena family or a top-notch artist association like Kih.

Who would really take it to heart?

His intuition told him.

That must be something ridiculously expensive.

"Don't worry, listen to what I say. I have already said that this is a bet between the Elena family and Kih. Since it is a bet, it is naturally impossible for only one party to bid. You haven't listened to the old man yet. What about the chairman’s promise?”

“The other party who made the bet offered a more precious bargaining chip. Compared with it, a piece of work by a German national treasure pales into insignificance. "

Watter paused deliberately, and saw the expected uncontrollable curiosity in the eyes of the young man next to him.

The sketch teacher, who had been impressed by the student's painting ability all afternoon, felt his vanity satisfied.

Then he cleared his throat, coughed twice, and spoke slowly.

"After the war, the chairman was recruiting representatives from the Austrian National Publishing Group and various leading art institutions to join the management of the oil painting magazine. He hoped to single-handedly turn the family magazine founded by his grandfather into a It is an authoritative, diverse and authoritative guide in the field of art criticism."

"And he is at the helm of this art aircraft carrier.people. ”

“To put it bluntly, in the past few years, art godfathers such as Larry Gagosian have always wanted to do what they wanted to do. The other party had already built the prototype half a century ago. "

"In exchange for the Berlin Palace, the chairman took out two thousand shares of the magazine. "

"Based on the depreciated exchange rate during the Allied occupation at that time, each share was valued at about 2,100 Reichsmarks in previous transactions. The shares only account for a small proportion of the magazine, and the total is almost the same as a fine Menzel watercolor. ”

“Both parties exchange each other. "

"The chairman got a fine painting that he had been thinking about for a long time. The Hamburg Art Association relied on the stocks it held to become a representative of the German art world and entered the board of directors and management of Oil Painting Magazine. ”

“It not only washes away the background of the Third Reich, but also puts down the historical baggage. The two organizations can join together to expand each other's influence, which is a win-win situation. This is the first half of the bet. The second half is the inspiration of the two seniors to the German painters."

Walter took a deep breath and told the story of this sky-high price bet from seventy years ago.

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"If within a century from the beginning of the performance of the contract, who among the members of kih can carve out exquisite and realistic watercolor brushwork like the craters on the moon on a peanut shell, in one place?" In the middle of the year, it successively won the highest awards in the three exhibitions of the Hamburg Artists Association Anniversary Exhibition, the Cologne Art Exhibition, and the "Kassel Documenta", which also aimed to get rid of the German cultural imprint of World War II and was still under preparation at the time.

"Then, he will automatically obtain the ownership of the Berlin Palace from the Irina family. And Kih will pay a sum of money equivalent to the value of the oil painting magazine shares that were donated to him as the artist's creative capital. . And regardless of the value of the shares at that time, whether the Oil Painting Magazine still exists, the capital for the creation must not be less than 4 million Reichsmarks or its equivalent."

Two thousand shares of the Oil Painting Magazine in 1946. Original shares

When Gu Weijing realizes.

When the chairman used such valuable things to bet, he couldn't help but tremble slightly.

Perhaps

Seventy years ago, shares in Oil Painting Magazine were nothing.

Two thousand shares are about the same as a Menzel landscape watercolor. In the eyes of the world, it is a normal exchange of equal value.

Let’s bet

Your family will produce an orange, and our family will produce an apple or something.

Although Oil Painting Magazine was already an established literary and art journal before World War II, it was still dependent on the Irina family.

And due to the war, publication was suspended for a period of time during World War II, and it was far from as famous as it is today. It has a unique and irreplaceable position in the field of art.

When establishing a bet.

The managerThe director is obviously worried that in the future changes to the magazine, the valuation will depreciate too much, or the painting will simply go bankrupt due to poor management.

Obviously, future generations do not need to worry about the poor management of oil painting magazines.

Although he hates this magazine.

But he also knows that this may be one of the paper media with the highest commercial value today.

Owning Menzel's paintings will make investors feel good, at least if they can beat inflation and not shrink the family's wealth.

The original stock held by Oil Painting Magazine has appreciated so fast that it makes people want to take off.

In the hands of the old chairman, the magazine was just a media passed down to him from his ancestors for entertainment and entertainment.

The political significance is far greater than the monetary significance, and it only accounts for a very small part of his property.

Two thousand shares were exchanged for kih, and he also received a painting of the Berlin Palace.

What a bargain.

Most of the shares sold to the Austrian National Publishing Group and the European Art Association were only sold for a symbolic one shilling in total.

No one can think of it.

Seventy years have passed, and the fruits picked casually in Elena’s family orchard have become the golden apples of the Muse.

Even if Miss Anna herself considers selling her main properties in South America and Australia and exhausts all the liquidity reserves she can mobilize, she still cannot buy one-third of the magazine's shares from the board of directors. return.

After the war, 4 million German marks were equivalent to about 20,000 pounds.

To this day.

Probably more than a million.

"Have you ever guessed what a huge sum of money it was for the magazine that was owned by the Hamburg Art Association today?" Vatel couldn't help but describe it in a tone like the treasure of the Golden King Solomon. Zumi boasted.

The sketch teacher stretched out the palm of his left hand, and then raised the index finger of his right hand to the side.

“An external professor in my high school happened to be a member of the Hamburg Artists Association. As early as the time when I was in school and heard this story, it was already worth six million pounds, so he added This is called the bet of the century between the moon and six million pounds."

Gu Weijing was amazed at the appreciation speed of the oil painting magazine's shares, and lamented that this was really an astronomical bonus.

Six million pounds of creative funding.

This money is enough to buy an island in the Pacific and become the king there.

This was the price when Professor Vatel was in school.

Based on the performance of oil paintings in the financial market in recent years, it is estimated that it will more than double or even double.

"Before the restructuring, it was no secret that the Hamburg Artists Association was the third largest holding organization of Oil Painting Magazine, after the Austrian government and the European Art Association, and had a seat on the board of directors. Oil Painting Magazine It’s marked on the official website.”

"In the first ten years, both parties regarded it simply as an incentive bet. They would tell every painter who joined kih about this reward agreement. Soon, when kih suddenly discovered that the oil painting in his hand After the shares suddenly became the most important asset of the association, the mentality changed subtly."

"The owner doesn't mind giving a sweet fruit to the fruit farmer who works the hardest."

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“But there is a high probability that no owner will be so generous as to give away his entire orchard to others, right?”

“The Elena family is also willing to maintain the oil painting magazine Therefore, after the death of the old chairman, the two parties almost never mentioned this agreement, and even deliberately kept it secret to control the spread of the news."

"Many local people in Hamburg. Art practitioners have heard similar stories. Some media tabloids, including oil painting magazines, have gossiped about this story, but both parties to the bet have been willing to maintain a tacit silence over the years. Refuse, ignore such news at all, and treat it coldly."

"Over time, this is like the treasure left behind by the pirate captain Blackbeard before he was hanged. It seems that there is such a thing. Not many people truly believe that this is true."

Vatel pointed to his nose proudly.

"You are one of those few people"

Gu Weijing looked at the German next to him.

He had been taking classes from the other party for several years at Dewey, but he did not realize that this old-fashioned and upright teacher was actually as well-informed and gossipy as Miss Kou Kou in his hometown.

"Hey, being a teacher at Dulwich College is also a very good job for art practitioners."

Watter noticed Gu Weijing's suspicious eyes and his self-esteem. Being hit, he knocked on the table angrily.

"Besides, Vattel is a well-known name in the Hamburg art circle. Our family may not have produced any great painters, but my great-grandfather has been a painter in the local church since then."