Comment by gjsman-1000
3 years ago
> The government threw money at the arts in the mid-20th-century to show up the USSR and people are reading too much into it. If classicism had been the thing in the middle of the 20th century they would have funded that instead.
I'm not so sure. Call it a conspiracy theory, but there is at least some evidence that modern art is a fantastic tool for money laundering. Now, this is also true of classical art and patents, but imagine if you are trying to send money with a stupid cover story. Make a piece of modern art in 15 minutes, have other person send $50,000 to "purchase" it...
I don't think the CIA needs to clandestinely fund an entire art movement as a cover for money laundering, though. That seems a bit outlandish.
I'm as paranoid as the next guy but in this case I think the premise that the CIA funded artistic expression as a form of propaganda in its own right makes the most sense.
It's more like it's one way to funnel money to an asset or network without raising suspicions.
But you're right, it was mostly about the propaganda. And not even particularly covert. The bit that did it has since been carved out into other agencies (eg National Endowment for Democracy).
> I don't think the CIA needs to clandestinely fund an entire art movement as a cover for money laundering, though. That seems a bit outlandish.
Besides...the CIA makes more money running illegal drugs.
Any high priced asset that's easy to move with few questions asked is a great tool for money laundering. One of the largest tools is real estate, which may be one reason you see a lot of unoccupied houses and condos in certain expensive cities.
The art doesn't have to be modern to work this way. It just has to be fungible art with an inflated price tag on it. Any style will do.
Other popular money laundering vehicles include: "investments" in totally hollow shell companies, fake customers to shell or cutout businesses (like the car wash in Breaking Bad), manipulating penny stocks (you basically run a pump and dump against yourself using dirty money to pump and extracting clean money on the other side), cryptocurrency and related things, other big assets like airplanes and boats, etc.
Real estate is traditionally quite difficult to move, that’s actually one of its core selling points.
And you can buy high end real estate with dirty money and then get clean money by taking loans out on the value of the property
Like NFTs, it could be money laundering, pumping, or both?