December 24th 2023
Lenin
The train has got further problems. I was directed to Berlin, through Frankfurt, but due to the seasonal flu combined with other strange circumstances, I will be subject to other stops. The Roman Catholic Christmas is approaching and the streets are fully decorated in a way that can be hardly described as Christian. The main chains are substituting the X of XMas with their own logos. The Soviet Revolution had more respect for religion than those capitalist thugs. Even worse, they are trying to eradicate any feeling from most of the human beings, to make them obedient machines. I am aware that communism helped them in a consistent way. At first by depriving the masses of any spirituality, secondly by creating fear among those who did not get infected by the revolutionary ideas. Not to forget the action of atheists, who called themselves liberals, within the Western society. Over the years, with more than a century of earthly experience behind me, I understood that all devilish plans sooner or later will fail. Although this hypothesis provides me with some optimism, there should have been a better way towards technological and economical progress. Or perhaps all those sad aspects are unavoidable and individuals cannot do too much to alleviate the side effects of evolution. What I wish for right now is to celebrate Christmas as many Westerners do, to feel the magic of the best day of the year as proclaimed for decades by American jingles. I have got enough gold and money in my pocket and I can choose.
The art dealer
While XMas is approaching, I have realised I have not already had the time to buy a gift for my dear friends. I usually rely for that on the shops of the Moma, of the Tate or Artware Editions. On the latter I have already shopped for Donald Sultan’s Mimosa napkins for my girlfriend. She looked for something useful, while I would have preferred a more original item. However, it is really hard to change her mind, especially on practical aspects of life. My ideal choice would have been for instance a lamp signed by Yoshitomo Nara. Beside that, I really love that artist, whose potential is not inferior to that of Gerhard Richter, I am also easily impressed by lamps and light games. However my girlfriend finds that the object provides too few business value for the actual price. On the contrary, I believe that such a tool can only increase in value along the years because it is also an expression of Yoshitomo Nara’s art. Some message dedicated to our daily life, that begins and ends by awakening in the morning and going to bed in the evening. Unless it is not the special day when we are destined to leave this world. Thus, the lamp will be beside us at least twice a day, excluding also those periods of the year that we spend away from home, on holidays. It can also be by taking part in an art fair abr4oad or being hospitalised. Or even attending a workshop in some distant location, from where it is not possible to commute. I would exclude prison. I can hardly imagine myself handcuffed and taken as a dangerous person.
The consultant
I am on the train, directed to Southern Italy and the city where I come from. I will have a stop in Lugano, because the idea of being back in Rho and spending a whole week makes me sick. My father loved the town, he exalted the mediaeval architecture that, although carefully hidden, can still be spotted with an attempted eye. He also mentioned to me the villas of the old aristocracy of Milan, including some German names belonging to families who perhaps settled there only because of the proximity to Milan. Rho on the contrary reminds me of the oil refinery, whose smell was still perceivable when I lived there as a child. Not to mention the local cafes, crowded by factory workers, most of them immigrants from Southern Italy, who always welcome me with some unpleasant jokes. I dreamed of sitting down in an elegant café in the city centre of Milan, among the tourists, the affluent ones from Japan or the United States. There were no Russians at the time, since the Iron Curtain confined them properly within their borders. I was trying to imagine how the people from the other side of the block, reasoning in terms of the cold war, could have looked like. Europe lived for several decades without any contact with the Russians, if not the few refugees who managed to escape so bravely. Their achievements were further highlighted in the newspapers as well as the accounts of the hardships suffered in the socialist countries. It is hard to believe that modern first tier consultancies are totally subject to the red propaganda and their employees must, in the worst case, comply or get fired. It is hard to believe how far liberals had gone and got brainwashed. At least the Soviet Union does not exist anymore.
