There’s money in potash. A lot of it.
Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev earned vast sums by mining the substance, used as an agricultural fertilizer. The question for “Rybo” became what to do with all his money, and just as importantly, how to shield it from taxes. For Rybolovlev and billionaires like him, an increasingly attractive strategy has been to invest in highly coveted works of art, which they then park in so-called “freeports” around the world, avoiding the clutches of the taxman.
The ways of the ultra-wealthy come under scrutiny in the gripping three-part documentary series The Oligarch and the Art Dealer, directed by Andreas Dalsgaard. Episode 1 premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January and all three parts just screened at CPH:DOX in Copenhagen. It’s a story that stretches from Gstaad and Geneva to Monaco and Moscow, with detours to Palm Beach, Florida, intersecting with Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein.
Elk Film/Pumpernickel Film
The Oligarch of the series’ title, naturally, is Rybolovlev, a man with an estimated net worth of $6.7 billion, give or take a few dollars or rubles. The “Art Dealer,” meanwhile, is one Yves Bouvier, a Swiss businessman and art world insider who pioneered the creation of freeports – sort of special “duty free zones” where the mega-rich can store assets and/or sell them. Episode 1 explores how Bouvier became an adviser to Rybolovlev, helping him assemble what Dalsgaard calls “the most expensive art collection in private hands traded in this century.” Rybolovlev and Bouvier got along terrifically – until they didn’t. The relationship collapsed after the oligarch came to suspect the art dealer had helped himself to a tranche of his wealth, to the tune of $1 billion. Their ugly dispute wound up in court.
Billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev
Elk Film/Pumpernickel Film
“These two went to war,” Dalsgaard tells Deadline over coffee at the posh Hotel Sanders in Copenhagen. “Suddenly, the public got access to how these 38 masterpieces were traded, all their emails, their text messages, their invoices, how they use offshore accounts.”
A world designed to remain opaque emerged from the shadows.
“The more we looked into the details of [the story], the more interesting it became. There were so many layers to it,” Dalsgaard observes. “There were so many insights into how does this 0.00001 percent [the super-wealthy], how is their life really like? Now we have the Epstein Files, and we get this insight into how money and power and influence operate, which has been a big shock to many. And I guess you could even call this the Bouvier Files.”
Swiss businessman and art world insider Yves Bouvier.
Elk Film/Pumpernickel Film
Bouvier is interviewed extensively in the series, defending himself.
“He was hung out to dry all over the world as the biggest fraudster in the history of the art world. And he clearly felt that by telling his story, that would at a minimum add some nuances to that image, possibly even turn the [spotlight] on the other guy,” Dalsgaard theorizes. He views what Bouvier had to say with healthy skepticism.
“If you look into the emails [between Rybolovlev and Bouvier], it’s also clear Bouvier made great efforts to disguise his own role in those deals from his client or his buyer because at the center of this legal dispute is the question of, was he an agent or was he a buyer and seller?” Dalsgaard explains. “If you buy and sell, you can charge whatever price the next buyer [will pay]. Whereas if he was an agent, he was helping Rybolovlev and should serve Rybolovlev’s interests… It was never our goal to try to decide who was the villain. They’re clearly somewhat gray-[area] characters, both of them.”
Director Andreas Dalsgaard
Elk Film/Pumpernickel Film
The director adds, “This story is not just about the legal fight in court, it’s also about who controls the narrative in the public.” As such, viewers – as judges of what narrative to believe – become “sort of a party to this and shifting sympathies and trying to figure out sort of who’s playing who.”
An eye-popping subplot takes the story to Trump territory in South Florida. The long friendship between the current president and the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein reportedly fell apart when they became rivals to acquire a multi-million-dollar property near Mar-a-Lago called, ironically, Maison de l’Amitié (House of Friendship).
The falling out “was over the purchase of the house that we see in this story,” Dalsgaard shares. Trump won the bidding war and later sold it to someone else. Guess who? “Rybolovlev buys it off Trump,” Dalsgaard says, with Trump pocketing tens of millions of dollars in profit.
That fascinating part of the tale unfolds in part 3 of The Oligarch and the Art Dealer. The series was one of only two episodic projects accepted at Sundance. “We have distribution in 10 European countries and Australia and Hong Kong and BBC Russia even,” Dalsgaard notes. So far, no deal for U.S. distribution has been reached, but there may be ample reason for optimism.
“It’s a film series that has been so well received. Also, when we tested with an audience — and we’ve done that multiple times both in the U.S. and in Europe — it really tests well on the level of entertainment, mystique, production value, and also the kind of insight it gives to the world,” Dalsgaard comments.
Regarding the potential for a U.S. distribution agreement, he says, “Fingers crossed it’s going to happen soon.”