In March 1850 Antoine Wiertz, an artist, wrote to the newish Belgian government offering a swap: his largest paintings in exchange for the construction of a “huge, comfortable and well-lit” studio. Somewhat surprisingly, his proposal was accepted. The interior minister, Charles Rogier, agreed to hand over a large sum of money to build a studio that would, after Wiertz’s death, display his works in perpetuity. Rogier’s was a terrible decision even at the time. For today’s governments, looking on 160 years later, it stands as a masterclass in maladministration.(…)
For a start, national champions are not always as durable as they appear, even when politicians, press and public are all clamouring for an institution to be rescued with copious state aid. People are bad at second-guessing posterity. Indeed, those who sound most convincing about the future are often merely describing present-day trends, or else they are just articulate lobbyists for today’s success stories.
Also, once the state displaces the market and takes responsibility for a commercial enterprise, whether a bank, a carmaker or a struggling painter with a gift for the gab, it can be surprisingly hard for it to back out again. And one should always beware of appeals to chauvinism and local pride. After a hostile reception by critics at the Paris salon of 1839, Wiertz published a furious call for Brussels to “rise up” and become “capital of Europe”, leaving Paris a mere “provincial” town. He was promptly awarded a medal by the Brussels authorities.
(Fonte: The Economist)
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