The Eye of the Needle

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The endless, first-world conundrum of the wealthy: what do I buy with my ill-gotten gains? Is our potential purchase guided by choice & desire of the object of our transaction: a genuine need to own and appreciate a fine watch, an artwork, or even a home? Or is the motivation simply to invest financially in an object purely for its monetary value? It's an age-old question, and one that irks me to this day. Simply put, I hate and abhor those with zero aesthetic sensibility who view the finest art and craftsmanship as mere bargaining chips in their ongoing cycle of transactory nonsense: a view to a financial kill, so to speak. I'm minded of the scene in the film "A Good Year", when Russell Crowe's character Max tasks his boss over the ownership of a Van Gogh painting: the one on display on the wall being a phenomenally-expensive copy, whilst the original is languishing unseen in a vault.

That this is the norm for most stupidly expensive things owned by most stupidly rich people, should come as no surprise: expensive paste worn in lieu of original jewels, paintings never seeing the light of day: watches that deserve to be worn and used by people that appreciate them for their intrinsic, rather than their market value, tucked away in specialised vaults where the movements are either kept wound by machines, or by staff employed by their owners so to do. I would dearly love to own and wear regularly a Breguet or Lange und Sohne watch; to cherish and appreciate a beautiful technical masterpiece of the horological art, but sadly it will never happen. Simply because I ain't rich enough. It wouldn't be half so bad if those with the money to afford them actually saw the point and beauty in such things.

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