I’ve stared at this LV ad for soooo long myself trying to figure out what the hell Mikhail Gorbachev must be thinking driving past the carcass of the Berlin Wall. Pretty loaded moment.
New York Mag’s Intelligencer did a little research on what seems to be a cryptic message in this Louis Vuitton ad. If you see the zoom in — there’s a magazine on his bag turned upside down that reads in Russian, “Litvinenko’s Murder — They Wanted to Give Up a Suspect for $7,000″.
Litvinenko was a fascinating figure who became a KGB agent in 1986, then after two years, was transferred to KGB’s Military Counter Intelligence. In 1991, he was promoted to Counter-Terrorist activities and “infiltration of organised crime” — which means he pissed off lots of people.
Among several other reports in his life, he wrote a book about President Vladimir Putin and some shady dealings in his administration, namely the Russian security service. By October 2006, Litvinenko fled Moscow and as a newborn British citizen, was granted political asylum.
Flash Forward to November 1, 2006 when Litvinenko drinks some funky tea in a London hotel and feels sick. Laced with polonium radiation poison, he dies 3 weeks later. Final words on his deathbed? “You may succeed in silencing one man but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life. May God forgive you for what you have done”.
The death was not widely covered in Russian news media, so is this some sort of political wink from Annie Leibovitz and Mikhail? Something to reflect on? It was after all, the first murder to launch an era of nuclear terrorism. Pretty deep.
All the facts I just stated are disputable because, well, in the messy world of espionage, everybody denies everything on the record. Even Litvinenko’s widow denies he was ever a spy! You decide your own truth:
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