The only thing differentiating Andrei Molodkin’s Dead Man Switch from soup hurled at the Mona Lisa is the reality of his threat.
We have seen countless attacks of masterpieces over the last 4 years. Paint has been thrown at tempered glass and safety hammers have cracked barriers. Until now, these attacks have been nothing but cooky symbolism.
Now, we have a real threat. Hanz Gruber has seized Nakatomi Plaza. Molodkin has $45 million dollars in masterworks locked in a vault with corrosive material set to be released if Julian Assange is killed. For once, this trope is compelling. For once, there are consequences.
Destruction of masterworks by activists has been a part of the avant-garde lexicon since 1914. The Rokeby Venus Attack by British suffragette Mary Richardson inspired Dada-ist critiques of the elevation of art. The idea is not nearly as progressive as activists would like us to think.
How art has become the poster victim of the climate crisis is a winding, often illogical road. Art as currency is a popular investment. Its value climbs each year, with works selling for millions. What protestors are asking; is art more valuable than life? However, two issues keep these attacks from meaning anything.
Firstly, the artworks aren’t being damaged. Museum security rivals TSA. Hurling soup at a Da Vinci is nothing more than clickbait. Secondly, their attacks lack the intellectual understanding of what they’re doing. Or, at least, the ability to properly market that idea. In post, images of artwork attacks are nothing more than temper tantrums with matching t-shirts, far from the monumental subversion of power these activists intend.
Enter Andrei Molodkin, a Russian dissident artist known for shocking, morbid works criticizing oil companies and foreign atrocities. On February 9, Molodkin announced his latest installation performance piece Dead Man Switch. Molodkin has filled a titanium safe with up to $45 million in artwork stored in crates. Inside the safe is a pneumatic pump connecting a barrel of acid powder to an accelerator.
Molodkin solved the two aforementioned issues by possessing the works and having a strong anti-authoritarian reputation.
Works by Picasso, Rembrandt, Jasper Johns, Rauschenberg, Andre Serrano, Warhol, Molodkin, and many more are protected by a 24-hour countdown timer that must be reset daily. The catch: to reset the timer “someone close” to Julian Assange must confirm he’s still alive.
Molodkin’s work typically uses ballpoint pen, blood, or crude oil to create sculptures and drawings.
In 2022, he sent a glass sculpture to the White House filled with the radioactive blood of men born in Nagasaki on the 77th anniversary of the Atomic Bomb. The sculpture demanded attention for potential nuclear attacks in Ukraine—a powerful piece, but indicative of Molodkin’s receptive banality.
In 2019, he created a glass sculpture of the White House filled with American blood in response to Trump’s election. In 2021, he projected a video of the sculpture onto Trump’s Washington DC hotel after the insurrection on January 6, 2021.
His work is no doubt satisfactory to those aligned with his anti-fascist, anti-authoritarian, and environmentalist views. And while sculptures filled with blood make statements, no matter how many times they’re created – they don’t affect change.
Dead Man’s Switch offers real consequences in the name of free speech. Julian Assange makes his appeal to the High Court of England on February 20 and 21, attempting to avoid extradition to the US where he faces a 175-year sentence for espionage. Becoming a household name in 2012, Assange released disclosed documents on US involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq on Wikileaks. Assange avoided US extradition by seeking asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London before his arrest by British officers and detainment in Belmarsh Prison in 2019.
Molodkin and Stella Assange, Julian’s wife, believe extradition will lead to Assange’s execution, suicide, or accidental death in prison. Should his appeal be dismissed, Assange has one option remaining; to seek an order in his favor from the European Court of Human Rights.
UK district courts originally blocked Assange’s extradition in 2021, claiming conditions would be “oppressive” to Assange resulting in suicide attempts. In 2022, a higher court overturned the decision citing assurances on acceptable prison conditions. Assange’s first appeal was rejected in 2023, his most current appeal is predicted to have the same fate.
Dead Man’s Switch not only has Stella Assange’s approval, it has our attention. Today’s culture is fascinated by the destruction of artwork and the ephemerality of its meaning. Banksy’s partially shredded artwork captured viewers, bringing laymen up to speed on the elevation of Art’s critique.
However, those in the know understand it’s been 110 years since the first Rokeby Venus Attack. Destruction of artwork is now overdone and pedestrian.
In a commercial sense, Molodkin and Assange will have eyes on them. The posters formally known as Twitterati will congregate and discuss. Sides will be taken and controversy will unfold.
Milano gallerist Giampaolo Abbondio, who contributed a Picasso to Molodkin’s vault, met the project with initial reluctance. He changed his tune after realizing Molodkin’s dedication to freedom of information.
“It’s more relevant for the world to have one Assange than an extra Picasso,” Giampaolo said in a quote to Sky News, “Let’s say I’m an optimist and I’ve lent it. If Assange goes free, I can have it back.”
Freedom of speech is massively important in a climate where fact is subjective and violence happens without a shred of coverage. If Dead Man’s Switch revives a productive conversation about access to information and freedom of speech, we may see one of the first successful threats to masterworks.
Or, Dead Man’s Switch will go down in history as an over-masculine, sideshow act on par with Chris Burden’s Shoot. Performance that makes a splash while feeding an artist’s ego, earning recognition for shock value rather than lasting impact.
“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.” Says Stella Assange to Sky News. “If democracy wins, the art will be preserved.”
