Much of the art was amassed in disgraceful circumstances, including Rembrandts from the Hermitage after the Russian revolution. “Surely Gulbenkian,” argues Conlin, “has something important to tell us at this moment in history”, when free enterprise and movement are under attack from both Left and Right. He had written a report on the exploitation of Mesopotamian oil in 1894; the first crude from Kirkuk reached the Mediterranean in 1934. Calouste, who had been educated abroad, a rootless commander of money, set about transforming this to an inconceivable extent. Donald Trump is a terrifyingly good finisher, Sarah Cooper’s Netflix special is a crime against comedy. He liked to relax by going over his children’s household expenses, and towards the end of his life he fretted about whether he could afford a “Big Ben” alarm clock from WH Smith. Lewis Jones reviews Mr Five Per Cent by Jonathan Conlin (Profile). His origins were in the close-knit Armenian community in Constantinople. Others at the time had moral objections to the Soviet commissars, one oilman stating firmly that ‘such money is used to promote revolution and murder. Still, the art remains in Lisbon — which was the one place in Europe he could go on living in five magnificent hotel suites throughout the second world war and afterwards, until his death in 1955. At one point, absurdly, he sued his father in open court, claiming 5 per cent of the 5 per cent. On the other hand, he maintained no particular principles about who he was prepared to trade with. A cinquante-sept ans, Calouste Gulbenkian venait de signer son plus beau chef-d'oeuvre. ‘I am the master — it is I who have the money — I will flatten everything in my path,’ Gulbenkian once told his wife. Call 0844 871 1514 or visit books.telegraph.co.uk to order a copy for £19.99. The ultimate citizen of nowhere, “always a visitor, never at home”, Gulbenkian was born in Istanbul in 1869, to a family of rich Armenian merchants, trading from Marseille and Manchester to Beirut and Baghdad, and came of age in the Ottoman Empire, which he saw torn apart by war and genocide. He declined a knighthood and the Légion d’honneur, and after renting a couple of yachts concluded that “the appeal of yachting is snobbery … it is an enormous waste, without any rewards, moral or physical”. Find out more, The Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. His role in securing agreement to oil concessions from the Persian and Iraqi parliaments certainly entailed bribery on a massive scale, and although he was terrified of socialism and abhorred all taxes he was happy to deal with Bolshevik Russia from 1921 to 1932, helping it to export petroleum from Grozny, gold from Lake Baikal, lead and zinc from Siberia, and art from the Hermitage, some of it to his own magnificent collection. Before the first world war, he had acquired a 5 per cent share of oil throughout the territories of the Ottoman empire. It is hard to see what that might be, but his story is a fascinating one. Gulbenkian was a “complex and evasive individual” and, unlike the publicity-hungry Nubar, he was obsessively private, and modest. Conlin frankly admits when one of Gulbenkian’s business dealings, intended to be obscure, remains impenetrable. The tycoon is beautifully summed up in many passing details, but perhaps particularly the list in his pocketbook of. He compels unwilling admiration for the sheer tenacity of his hero over decades, while leaving us in no doubt of the hellish narrowness of Calouste’s focus. Gulbenkian filled his palace with his art collection, and worked and dined there, alone, and showered there – or was showered, by his valet with a pressurised hose, as he stood in a niche lined with silver leaf – but always slept in his suite at the Ritz. He made his first fortune in London in the 1890s, in a “racy corner” of the Stock Exchange trading in volatile South African mining companies, in league with the notorious crooks Horatio Bottomley and Whitaker Wright. Calouste’s family life was a sorry affair. No doubt in a couple of centuries hardly anyone will pose these questions, and the Gulbenkian Foundation will appear as innocuous as Kedleston Hall. He worried about his health, and followed a strict diet of fruit and raw vegetables, curds, malt extract and unrefined sugar, while his valet was burdened with pills, oils, powders, salts, creams, lotions and gargles. The Armenian massacres made no impact on his dealings with Turks. Money is made, and then it sets about dignifying itself. Still, the art remains in Lisbon — which was the one place in Europe he could go on living in five magnificent hotel suites throughout the second world war and afterwards, until his death in 1955.

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