[Yeouido Art Museum]①Before the Coin Craze, There Was the 'Tulip Mania'

Expensive Tulips Placed at the Top of 16th-17th Century Dutch Still Life Paintings
'Tulip' Speculation Aiming for Quick Riches... Price Collapse Leads to Suicides
Investors Devastated by Terra and Luna Crash... Lawmaker Kim Nam-guk Faces Coin Speculation Allegations

'Still Life with Flowers' (1639)_Hans Bolongier

'Vanitas vanitatum omnia vanitas (Vanity of vanities, all is vanity)'

Ecclesiastes 1:2, Old Testament

A dazzling bouquet of flowers catches the eye. Let’s take a moment to carefully savor it wherever your gaze falls. What feelings arise? Although it is a painting of flowers, it is not simply pretty. The flowers, which should be under dazzling sunlight, are placed indoors without windows. The tulips decorating the upper part are splendid but lifeless. The pink flowers at the bottom are already wilting.

Shall we slowly move our eyes from the top to the bottom of the painting again? You can see both the peak of beauty and the withering of its prime simultaneously. It makes one think that even breathtaking beauty lasts only briefly.

'Still Life with Flowers and Skull' (1643), Adriaen van Utrecht, Private Collection

A painting depicting inanimate objects such as flowers and fruits is called a still life. As the English term 'still life' and the Italian 'natura morta' suggest, it is a painting of a motionless or dead nature.

The still life became established as a genre starting from the 17th century. It was especially popular in Flanders (Northern Netherlands), and there is a reason for this. At that time, trade and distribution rapidly developed in the Flanders region. Particularly, maritime trade with Africa, North America, and Japan flourished, increasing the wealthy middle class. This period is known as the 'Dutch Golden Age.'

Artists began to paint works reflecting the tastes of the newly wealthy middle class rather than royalty or nobility. As a result, still lifes and genre paintings depicting everyday scenes or philosophical themes became popular instead of historical or mythological subjects.

In 16th-17th century Dutch still lifes, flower paintings are easy to find. There is a formula when painting flowers: as in the first painting, a conical composition is created, placing the most beautiful and expensive flowers at the very top.

Tulip Field (1638)_Jacob Gerritsz Cuyp

In still life paintings, tulips are mostly depicted at the very top. This shows how precious and beloved tulips were at the time. Tulips were not originally native to the Netherlands. They grew in the Tianshan Mountains of Central Asia and passed through the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) before reaching Austria.

Then, in 1593, Charles de l'?cluse, a botanist from Flanders, brought tulip bulbs to the Netherlands, introducing them for the first time. The tulip, with its distinctive shape and vivid colors, quickly captured the hearts of the Dutch. Since it took 3 to 7 years for the flowers to bloom, the price was very high. Some tulips were infected by viruses, causing them to bloom with unusual shapes and colors.

The 'Semper Augustus tulip' is a representative example. As shown in the painting, a single flower displays both white and red colors simultaneously. It was a rare mutant variety. Thanks to this rarity, prices soared. Soon, tulips became a luxury item.

Whenever I see still life paintings of tulips, I think of Instagram. Just as people post omakase photos and flaunt luxury purchases on Instagram, tulip still lifes subtly displayed wealth.

Tulip Speculation for Quick Riches... The World's First Bubble

Tulips soon shifted from luxury goods to speculative assets. It was not just 'plant tech' but even futures trading on tulip bulbs emerged. By 1634, a rare virus-infected tulip bulb was traded at a price equivalent to about 36,423 square meters of land?roughly the size of five soccer fields (about 7,100 square meters each).

The manic bubble did not last long. On February 3, 1637, tulip prices suddenly collapsed. As tulip prices plummeted, all promissory notes received as payment for tulips defaulted. Those who entered the tulip speculation late suffered huge losses, some even committing suicide. Eventually, the Dutch parliament banned all tulip trading. The 'Tulip Mania' is recorded as the first bubble in history.

Still Life with Skull (1671), Philippe de Champaigne, Mus?e Tess?, France

Terra and Luna Crash... Fraud Exploiting the Desire for Quick Riches

The 16th-17th century tulip speculation shares similarities with cryptocurrencies. As demand surged, prices rose, and rising prices encouraged further buying in anticipation of price increases.

Terra and Luna are cryptocurrencies that crashed suddenly like the tulip bubble. They appeared in 2019 during a general downturn in the crypto market under the name 'stablecoin' and at one point ranked among the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization.

Terra attracted much demand by promising price stability pegged 1:1 to the US dollar. It linked the cryptocurrency Luna as collateral for the $1 value, but the structure was contradictory: when Terra’s price fell, Luna’s supply increased. Luna, which traded around 100,000 KRW, crashed over 99%, causing many victims like the tulip bubble.

I once met someone who made 40 billion KRW from crypto but lost it all. When I asked why they didn’t cash out, they said, "I got greedy trying to buy a building in Gangnam without loans, and things went wrong." That person has since returned to their original job and works quietly. Recently, Kim Nam-guk, a member of the Democratic Party who left the party, has been criticized amid allegations of crypto speculation.

'Breakfast Table with Blackberry Pie' (1631), Willem Clasz Heda

It is truly futile when you think about it. There is a still life painting conveying the lesson that money, youth, power, and beauty all last only a moment. This is called 'Vanitas.' It became a genre of still life painting popular in 16th century Netherlands during the height of tulip mania. 'Vanitas' means 'vanity' in Latin.

At that time, the Netherlands was largely Protestant. In a religious atmosphere emphasizing 'asceticism' as a core doctrine, openly expressing desire for wealth was not acceptable. As the economy grew and the wealthy middle class expanded, Vanitas still lifes emerged as a reflection on the rampant desire for wealth. The theme of Vanitas?desiring wealth but not becoming a slave to desire?is a teaching that resonates even with us living in 2023.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.