Russian artist 'holds $45million of art hostage to free Julian Assange': Andrei Molodkin vows to dissolve Pablo Picasso | Canada News Media
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Russian artist ‘holds $45million of art hostage to free Julian Assange’: Andrei Molodkin vows to dissolve Pablo Picasso

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A Russian artist has vowed to use acid to destroy masterpieces by Pablo Picasso, Rembrandt and Andy Warhol if Julian Assange dies in prison.

Andrei Molodkin claims to have collected 16 works of art which he estimates to be worth a total of $45 million, and is now threatening to destroy them if his demands are not met.

The artworks, he claims, are being stored in a 29-tonne safe with an ‘extremely corrosive’ substance, and will only be returned to their owners if Assange is freed from prison.

The WikiLeaks founder is awaiting the results of his final appeal against being extradited to the US, where he faces espionage charges and up to 175 years in jail.

The controversial artist supporting his release claims his safe will be locked on Friday, and its contents will be completely dissolved if a ‘Dead Man’s Switch’ timer is not reset daily.

The 24-hour countdown timer will only be reset, he says, if ‘someone close’ to Assange confirms he is still alive every day,

The artworks, he claims, are being stored in a 29-tonne safe with an 'extremely corrosive' substance

It comes amid concerns from Assange’s supporters that he is suffering from ill health, with his lawyer saying that his ‘life is at risk’ if he is extradited.

‘In our catastrophic time – when we have so many wars – to destroy art is much more taboo than to destroy the life of a person,’ Molodkin told Sky News.

‘Since Julian Assange has been in prison… freedom of expression, freedom of speech, freedom of information has started to be more and more repressed. I have this feeling very strongly now.’

Molodkin has previously made headlines after dousing copies of Prince Harry’s memoir Spare with ‘blood’ in protest against his revelation killed the fighters while serving in Afghanistan.

The sculptor is a former Soviet Army soldier, anti-war campaigner and Russian dissident, and now lives in the south of France.

He previously made a huge portrait of Vladimir Putin using blood donated by Ukrainian soldiers, and says he is unable to return to Russia as he fears he would be imprisoned by Putin’s regime for his work.

His latest stunt, he claims, was done with the help of artists and donors who gave him art in a show of support for Assange.

He has refused to identify the exact works in the safe, but says it contains some of his own work as well as art by Picasso, Rembrandt, Warhol, Jasper Johns, Jannis Kounellis, Robert Rauschenberg, Sarah Lucas, and others.

A Milan gallery owner claims he provided a Picasso piece for the safe and has signed a non-disclosure agreement from revealing which one.

Giampaolo Abbondio, who has known Molodkin for years, said he initially said there was ‘no way’ he would offer up the work, but was later convinced.

‘It got me round to the idea that it’s more relevant for the world to have one Assange than an extra Picasso, so I decided to accept,’ he told Sky.

Molodkin is said to be keeping the safe at his studio in southern France before moving it to a museum.

Inside the lock-up, two white barrels have been pictured next to crates said to contain the artworks.

One of the barrels, Molodkin claims, contains acid powder, while the other contains an accelerator which could trigger a chemical reaction that would completely decimate the works.

Assange’s wife Stella is supporting the Dead Man’s Switch project, which she called ‘a work of art’.

‘Julian’s political imprisonment is an act of real terrorism against democracy.

‘The true targets here are not just Julian Assange but the public’s right to know, and the future of being able to hold power accountable.

‘If democracy wins, the art will be preserved – as will Julian’s life.’

The WikiLeaks founder has been held in HMP Belmarsh maximum security prison in southeast London since April 2019, after being forcibly removed from Ecuador’s embassy when his seven-year diplomatic asylum was revoked.

A public hearing is set to take place on 20 and 21 February, and is considered the final chance for Assange to prevent his extradition.

 

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40 Random Bits of Trivia About Artists and the Artsy Art That They Articulate – Cracked.com

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40 Random Bits of Trivia About Artists and the Artsy Art That They Articulate  Cracked.com



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John Little, whose paintings showed the raw side of Montreal, dies at 96 – CBC.ca

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John Little, whose paintings showed the raw side of Montreal, dies at 96  CBC.ca



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A misspelled memorial to the Brontë sisters gets its dots back at last

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LONDON (AP) — With a few daubs of a paintbrush, the Brontë sisters have got their dots back.

More than eight decades after it was installed, a memorial to the three 19th-century sibling novelists in London’s Westminster Abbey was amended Thursday to restore the diaereses – the two dots over the e in their surname.

The dots — which indicate that the name is pronounced “brontay” rather than “bront” — were omitted when the stone tablet commemorating Charlotte, Emily and Anne was erected in the abbey’s Poets’ Corner in October 1939, just after the outbreak of World War II.

They were restored after Brontë historian Sharon Wright, editor of the Brontë Society Gazette, raised the issue with Dean of Westminster David Hoyle. The abbey asked its stonemason to tap in the dots and its conservator to paint them.

“There’s no paper record for anyone complaining about this or mentioning this, so I just wanted to put it right, really,” Wright said. “These three Yorkshire women deserve their place here, but they also deserve to have their name spelled correctly.”

It’s believed the writers’ Irish father Patrick changed the spelling of his surname from Brunty or Prunty when he went to university in England.

Raised on the wild Yorkshire moors, all three sisters died before they were 40, leaving enduring novels including Charlotte’s “Jane Eyre,” Emily’s “Wuthering Heights” and Anne’s “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.”

Rebecca Yorke, director of the Brontë Society, welcomed the restoration.

“As the Brontës and their work are loved and respected all over the world, it’s entirely appropriate that their name is spelled correctly on their memorial,” she said.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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