Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
Speaker 1: Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're picking up where we
Speaker 1: left off with the Vanity Fair article talking about Leon Black.
Speaker 1: The author of this article once again is Nae Freeman.
Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety eight, Black was named to the Art
Speaker 1: News Top two hundred Collectors list, the industry bible for
Speaker 1: the people who collect at the highest level. Who was
Speaker 1: around this time that Black started throwing his money into institutions.
Speaker 1: He lent work to a blockbuster Goya show at the
Speaker 1: National Gallery of Art in two thousand and one, and
Speaker 1: back to show centered on Pierre Matisse as a dealer
Speaker 1: at the Morgan Library in two thousand and two. He
Speaker 1: was the primary backer of a month show at MoMA
Speaker 1: in two thousand and six. So, look, this dude is
Speaker 1: definitely locked in and the world of art they love him.
Speaker 1: There is no doubt that he is a favored son
Speaker 1: of the world of high end art. And I think
Speaker 1: it really just tells you everything you need to know.
Speaker 1: All the people involved in MoMA, all the people involved
Speaker 1: in all these events that have them there and especially
Speaker 1: giving them a place of prominence, well they have some
Speaker 1: questions to answer right now. Look, people are going to
Speaker 1: get invited to events, and I understand that. I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that Leon Black shouldn't be invited to events, but
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean we're not gonna have questions or criticism
Speaker 1: about it. When you have somebody that's this highly placed
Speaker 1: in society, who was obviously deeply intertwined with one of
Speaker 1: the biggest criminals maybe in the past what thirty forty
Speaker 1: years in this country, and when you look at Jeffrey
Speaker 1: Epstein's crimes free, I don't think that's hyperbole because remember,
Speaker 1: we're not just talking about the abuse. We're talking about
Speaker 1: financial crimes. We're talking about sham marriages, immigration crimes, all
Speaker 1: sorts of shit, and Leon Black was right in the
Speaker 1: middle of all of it. He was also beginning to
Speaker 1: hobnob at art world events. In two thousand, Black attended
Speaker 1: Art Basel, Miami Beach and was seated at a W
Speaker 1: magazine dinner for Don and Merrow Rubel next to Stefano Tanci,
Speaker 1: the publications editor at the time. In twenty twelve, he
Speaker 1: bought the art book publisher Fadon, and in twenty fourteen
Speaker 1: he added the online art concern art Space to its holdings,
Speaker 1: so basically the godfather of art at this point, right,
Speaker 1: if you're doing anything at high end art, you're probably
Speaker 1: involved with Leon Black. And if you're involved with Leon Black,
Speaker 1: that makes you adjacent to Jeffrey Epstein, right, because at
Speaker 1: this point everybody knows what Leon Black is, So if
Speaker 1: you still choose to associate with him, well that's on you.
Speaker 1: And I don't want to hear anything about, oh, my reputation,
Speaker 1: because if you cared about your reputation, you wouldn't be
Speaker 1: hanging out with people that were adjacent to Jeffrey Epstein
Speaker 1: or that were involved in Jeffrey Epstein's day to day activities.
Speaker 1: But here we are. The audience were also when Black
Speaker 1: started working in close collaboration with Jeffrey Epstein. In Black's
Speaker 1: interview with the Seleck Committee, he claimed he trusted Epstein
Speaker 1: simply because so many other respected individuals also dependent on
Speaker 1: him to look over their cash. Such a BS excuse.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine being as rich as Leon Black and
Speaker 1: just following along with everybody else? Do you really think
Speaker 1: that's what happened? Do you really think Leon Black one
Speaker 1: day woke up and said, you know what, I really
Speaker 1: wonder what Deepak Chopra's up to. I wonder what Bill
Speaker 1: Gates is doing as far as their finances. I wonder
Speaker 1: if I should do what they're doing and talk to
Speaker 1: the people they're talking to as if Leon Black wasn't
Speaker 1: already as rich as all of them, basically certainly richer
Speaker 1: than Choprah. But because all these other people were doing it,
Speaker 1: Leon Black's going to get on board. Does that sound
Speaker 1: like somebody who built the fortune that Leon Black built?
Speaker 1: Does that sound like somebody who's always been at the
Speaker 1: head of the class. Just to get in line and
Speaker 1: follow along with everybody else and do what everybody else
Speaker 1: is doing. Doesn't make sense to me, and I doubt
Speaker 1: it makes sense to you. By the time I first
Speaker 1: paid Epstein in twenty thirteen, I knew him to possess
Speaker 1: an unrivaled network of relationships with individuals and finance, academia, science,
Speaker 1: and politics. Black said, a group that included Deepak Chopra,
Speaker 1: Tom Barrock, Tom Pritzker, Reed Hoffman, Elon Musk, Sergey Brinn,
Speaker 1: Bill Gates, former President Bill Clinton, Peter Thiel, and Steve Bannon,
Speaker 1: among others. And look, there's no doubt that that's a
Speaker 1: list of so called respectable businessmen. Right, But when you
Speaker 1: start getting down to it, how many of them had
Speaker 1: ties to Ebstein? Oh that's right, all of them. And
Speaker 1: because of those ties, mister Black says, that's why he
Speaker 1: wanted to be friends with Ebstein too. And make no mistake, folks,
Speaker 1: that's all part of the hustle. They'll all just blame
Speaker 1: each other. Oh well, I had no idea, Meaning Bill Gates,
Speaker 1: Leon Black was hanging out with him, so I thought
Speaker 1: it was cool, and on and on it goes. But
Speaker 1: nobody ever takes responsibility or accountability for the shit they
Speaker 1: did or for the people they were associating with. And
Speaker 1: if d pac Choper likes the guy who is Leon Black,
Speaker 1: not to trust him basically what I just said, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, we're talking about one of the richest, most
Speaker 1: powerful men, one of the most shrewd men when it
Speaker 1: comes to money in the whole world. But all of
Speaker 1: a sudden he needs all this help and advice from
Speaker 1: a former math teacher from Balton High School or Dalton
Speaker 1: School who got kicked out, who got fired. This is
Speaker 1: the guy you're bringing in. You mean to tell me
Speaker 1: there's no other professionals in the industry that could do
Speaker 1: what Epstein does. Well, I'm going to tell you that's bullshit, unless,
Speaker 1: of course, you're talking about stashing money, hiding it, coloring it,
Speaker 1: and laundering it, because that's the reason you use Jeffrey
Speaker 1: Epstein's services. So stop the bullshit, stop the lies, and
Speaker 1: stop trying to tell us that you have had no idea.
Speaker 1: Black is one of the few private citizens to personally
Speaker 1: own a globally famous guy on the street would recognize
Speaker 1: this work of art. Softbees was set to sell Edward
Speaker 1: Munch's The Scream, which had an estimated value of eighty million.
Speaker 1: Biddings started at forty million, with half a dozen buyers
Speaker 1: actively in the hunt. The late Softbees vice president Charles Mofford,
Speaker 1: speaking with a client on the landline phone outlasted them all.
Speaker 1: After a twelve minute bidding war, the Hammer came down
Speaker 1: at one hundred and seven million, or nearly one hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty million with the buyer's premium, making it the
Speaker 1: most expensive work of art ever sold at that point.
Speaker 1: One hundred and twenty million dollars for that picture. That art.
Speaker 1: I just don't get it. Now. Maybe I'm just not
Speaker 1: cultured enough, but I don't get it. The thought of
Speaker 1: spending that kind of money on a piece of art
Speaker 1: is absolutely insane. I mean, what are we even doing here?
Speaker 1: Eighty million dollars and then it goes all the way
Speaker 1: up to one hundred and twenty and on the phone
Speaker 1: with Moffitt was Leon Black. At the time, the price
Speaker 1: was shocking. Now it seems a bit quaint, honestly, a
Speaker 1: steal at a time when works with much less cultural
Speaker 1: weight have been selling for hundreds of millions of dollars,
Speaker 1: the demand for undeniable trophies is far out pacing the supply. Well,
Speaker 1: that tells me that there's a lot of people out
Speaker 1: there with way more money than they need. Maybe we
Speaker 1: should be doing some audits on these people with these
Speaker 1: gigantic art collections. Might be a great idea, right, And look,
Speaker 1: I'm not one of these people that wants to steal
Speaker 1: all the money from the rich people, blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: But they're obviously laundering their money and they're obviously hiding it.
Speaker 1: And the sad truth is Congress writes these tax laws
Speaker 1: with that in mind. They have to have loopholes, right
Speaker 1: for the people that really pay the bills, for the
Speaker 1: people that really control the party, and like I've been
Speaker 1: telling you from the very beginning, those people are people
Speaker 1: likely on Black. Some estimate that if Leon Black ever
Speaker 1: put The Scream up again at auction, it would become
Speaker 1: the first artwork to sell for over one billion. The
Speaker 1: purchase cemented his status as a true trophy hunter, buying
Speaker 1: up master works for his private collection. Just six months
Speaker 1: after The Scream sold for the record price, the Museum
Speaker 1: of Modern Art organized an exhibition put together by Chief
Speaker 1: curator and Temken that showcase the iconic work, and the
Speaker 1: Waltech said it was loaned from a private collection. At
Speaker 1: the time, Black was serving as the vice chair on
Speaker 1: the board, and by twenty fifteen he was selected co
Speaker 1: chairman of one of our culture's most exclusive clicks, the
Speaker 1: Moment Board. Just another group I would never want anything
Speaker 1: to do with. The second you tell me it's an
Speaker 1: exclusive click, No thank you. You know, these motherfuckers are
Speaker 1: up to no good and they're probably dancing around that
Speaker 1: owl out at Bohemian growth, bunch of weird mask wearing
Speaker 1: sons of bitches. In twenty eighteen, Black was elected the
Speaker 1: sole chair of the board of MoMA, having ascended to
Speaker 1: that perch over the course of decades, but a few
Speaker 1: years later, the ground swell of anger around the Epstein
Speaker 1: revelations was forcing a reckoning throughout the museum world. When
Speaker 1: Black's term as chair of the MoMA Board was coming
Speaker 1: up in twenty twenty one, he decided to opt out
Speaker 1: of returning, but he did not leave the board, where
Speaker 1: he remains today. As Lowry told WSJ at the time,
Speaker 1: he chose not to run for reelection for the chair
Speaker 1: because he wanted to make a decision that was not
Speaker 1: going to be harmful to the museum. Well here's an idea,
Speaker 1: don't be a scumbag that might help our board looked
Speaker 1: very carefully at Leon and ultimately decided that he was
Speaker 1: a solid trustee and he should remain. Lowry also noted
Speaker 1: that Leon has never been charged with the crime related
Speaker 1: to Epstein. They love to be slick with that shit, right, Oh,
Speaker 1: he was never charged. Well, he was never charged, He
Speaker 1: was never investigated, so how can he be charged. They
Speaker 1: think they're cute, but they're really not. That same month,
Speaker 1: March twenty twenty one, he stepped down from his roles
Speaker 1: as CEO of Apollo way earlier than expected. An investigation
Speaker 1: into his connections to Epstein by the law firm Deckert
Speaker 1: wrapped up in January of twenty twenty one, finding no
Speaker 1: evidence of wrongdoing. Yet, even though he'd planned to step
Speaker 1: down in July, he cut the cord months earlier, citing
Speaker 1: his health. It's always their health, right, Well, I need
Speaker 1: to spend more time with my family. You mean the
Speaker 1: family that you were cheating on. That family. And then
Speaker 1: in January of twenty twenty six, the Epstein Files were released.
Speaker 1: Art world media junkies quickly figured out that the largest
Speaker 1: cash of art related documents in the Epstein Files has
Speaker 1: to do with Black. Taken together, this collection of emails,
Speaker 1: bank statements, and tax dossiers doesn't just offer the fullest
Speaker 1: picture of an art collector in the Epstein Files, it
Speaker 1: might offer the most forensic, under the hood dive into
Speaker 1: a private art collection ever publicly released. The documents showed
Speaker 1: that in March of twenty fifteen, Black put up one
Speaker 1: billion of his art as collateral to secure a four
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty four million dollar loan from Bank of America.
Speaker 1: By twenty seventeen, the collateral package had grown in value
Speaker 1: a one point four billion, and the loan was six
Speaker 1: hundred and ninety five million. The Epstein files revealed that
Speaker 1: Black's art collection is an LLC holding that he owns
Speaker 1: outright or is linked to. In order to facilitate this,
Speaker 1: every single work that he owned had to be personally
Speaker 1: and meticulously cataloged by Epstein, who had been providing Black
Speaker 1: with what was described as financial advice to the tune
Speaker 1: of an astounding one hundred and seventy million, which Black
Speaker 1: paid to Ebstein over the course of six years. So
Speaker 1: if you're a crack dealer and you're selling crack out
Speaker 1: of your mom's house, they can seize your mom's house.
Speaker 1: So why isn't Leon Black under investigation? And then if
Speaker 1: it gets to a point where he gets convicted, they
Speaker 1: should seize all this heart and sell it off and
Speaker 1: give it to the survivors. But as we all know,
Speaker 1: those laws are only for us. Pouring over the spreadsheet
Speaker 1: brings endless surprises. It's simply unheard of for the public
Speaker 1: to get a hold of the collection, manifest usually shrouded
Speaker 1: and Pentagon levels a secrecy. Some of the bigger ticket
Speaker 1: items that Black has acquired over the years appear in
Speaker 1: the endless list of thousands of paintings sculptures, video, furniture pieces,
Speaker 1: artifacts and antiques. There's a Picasso sculpture Postai de Femi
Speaker 1: that was tied up in a dispute with a Gaitari
Speaker 1: royal family. But until the release of the Epstein files,
Speaker 1: we didn't know the official price that Black paid for it.
Speaker 1: Now we do, one hundred and twenty five million. They
Speaker 1: also reveal that, in addition to the Rafael that Black
Speaker 1: bought at Christie's London in two thousand and nine, Black
Speaker 1: also bought the Rafael offered at South Beast, London in
Speaker 1: twenty twelve for forty eight million. Just throwing money around, huh.
Speaker 1: I wonder how much of this was reported. I wonder
Speaker 1: how much of this is taxable. It's unclear whether black
Speaker 1: standing in the cultural Mulay will ever fully shift. Even
Speaker 1: following his June testimony, he still owns a Scream, which
Speaker 1: is reportedly on view at the former home of Noldler Gallery,
Speaker 1: which Black purchased for fifty million in twenty fifteen. MoMA
Speaker 1: did not respond to a request for comment. Zero chance.
Speaker 1: They have nothing to say. They just want to cash
Speaker 1: the checks. That's all they care about. During the congressional hearing,
Speaker 1: Black claimed that he was completely unaware of EV's Mean's
Speaker 1: criminal activity, even though in two thousand and eight Epstein
Speaker 1: had fleeted guilty to one count of solicitation a prostitution
Speaker 1: and one count a soliciting prostitution from a person under eighteen.
Speaker 1: He served thirteen months in prison. No, he didn't thirteen
Speaker 1: months in a stockade. Epstein was registered sex offender for
Speaker 1: the entirety of his relationship with Black. Evidently, this particular
Speaker 1: black mark against Epstein didn't especially bother a Black Well
Speaker 1: fellow travelers, right, The only problem would be if Epstein
Speaker 1: was broke. I took it seriously, Black toll pucks William D.
Speaker 1: Cohen in twenty twenty four. But I didn't take it
Speaker 1: that seriously. I mean, he was with a seventeen year
Speaker 1: old prostitute, got prosecuted for it and got put away
Speaker 1: for a year, and Geno, according to him, even that
Speaker 1: person had shown an id that she wasn't under age.
Speaker 1: My feeling is there are serious things and there are
Speaker 1: things that are less serious. I didn't think it was
Speaker 1: the end of the world, frankly, And if you were
Speaker 1: wondering why the Florida prosecution is such a gigantic black
Speaker 1: eye here it is. That's their excuse, right, Oh we
Speaker 1: didn't know. Well he was prosecuted for a seventeen year
Speaker 1: old girl, Yeah, after he manipulated the whole entire fucking
Speaker 1: process to make sure that was the only charge that stuck.
Speaker 1: But sure, bang on with your bullshit. The files later
Speaker 1: revealed that Black wrote a note to Epstein on his
Speaker 1: fiftieth birthday, calling him best of all, a dear friend,
Speaker 1: and signed it lovin kisses Leon. So you know that
Speaker 1: big club that George Carlin always talked about, Well this
Speaker 1: is it and you and I were still not invited.
Speaker 1: All the information that goes with this episode can be
Speaker 1: found in the description box.