Photos of pimped up private jets that belong to African dictators

Brighton's international photography festival has Nick Gleis' photographs of "the pimped up private jets that belong to African dictators and other heads of state." The interiors of these planes are the last word in understated sophistication.

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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lorq

Well, I’ll be — that looks like a John Berkey painting hanging on the wall in photo #5.

How much you wanna bet that particular plane belongs to George Lucas? (Remember Chancellor Palpatine’s chambers…?)
gregduncan

well, we really need to regroup. I guess my yamaha raptor 250r should be taken into consideration too..
Daedalus

“I am a king! Should I not live like one?”
alllie

I didn’t see much in the way of seat belts. Meaningless display over safety.
Yamazakikun

Teodoro Obiang’s must be pretty sweet, but it’s not in that gallery â€” none of those shots are narrowbody enough to be a Gulfstream V.
Rayonic

Makes me proud that my 25 cents per day helped fund one of these cool jets.
jpixl

I saw Syd Mead talk one time and he showed some slides of crazy, high-end aircraft interiors he’d designed for a mega-dictator/rich dude of some kind.
ackpht

A G5 is what these people use to pick up their kids from school. Think 747 or A380.
- Felton
  
  They would have just walked to school, but, statistically speaking, flying was safer.
jaytkay

Hey, Mark.

Why do you use the word “pimp” on the particular post?

Just wondering?
- Felton
  
  It’s in the linked Telegraph article. Or are you asking what it means in this context?
dw_funk

If I ever meet the guy who came up with the “slideshow” webpage design, I’m going to punch him in the throat.
proletariat

I’m sure Fox News will be disappointed to see that Air Force One is not pictured.
Lexicat

eat the rich.
- Brainspore
  
  eat the rich.
  
  That was African dictator Idi Amin’s philosophy! No, wait- that was “eat your political adversaries.”
  
  I wonder if his ride is in this show. He probably had a fancy jet at some point, but it’s hard to get the smell of unspeakable horror out of the upholstery.
  - Nadreck
    
    Now, now: the evidence for Idi Amin being a cannibal is very slim. A vicious, paranoid killer directly or indirectly responsible for a million or so deaths yes; but a cannibal, maybe. We have only the word of one foreign correspondent on that.
    Bokassa, on the other hand, was the full meal deal: mostly school children.
    Amin was a Hero Of the Left; Bokassa a Hero of the Right.
  - mdh
    
    Seems like those dictators might be compensating for something. hmmm.
Antinous / Moderator

Looks like the Enterprise D decorated by Imelda Marcos.
- grimc
  
  Not nearly enough shoes
jimh

Shit, these guys are biting my style.
inkfumes

Disgusting.
grimc

Silly British press: It’s pimped out.
- jungletek
  
  Came here to say this.
Teller

The last word in understated if the last word is Not.
Lobster

Next, let’s have a look at the anti-aircraft missile launchers in use by their political opponents. Note the spinners…
holtt

It’s kinda… uh… presumptive to use the “African leaders” heading. It’s not exactly clear reading the photo captions just where they are from, not to mention how many aren’t owned by private or corporate individuals.

And Antinous – spot on :)
- AnthonyMitchell
  
  Oh, I recognize that aircraft, registration number JY-ABH. Itâ€™s an A340-211 that was originally outfitted for a member of the royal family of Brunei. It was sold to the King of Jordan in October 2000.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  I can’t find a single painting of a nude Jean-Luc Picard taming a lion.
Felton

Did Zapp Brannigan finally get sick of red velour?
Cowicide

They very obviously did it for the nookie.
Anonymous

I love the artwork. Do these dictators wear turtleneck sweaters and gold chains with the ‘male’ symbol around their neck?
JonStewartMill

I didn’t have the attention span or the stomach to look at all the photos. All I know is, if I had to decorate my own Gulfstream it would be totally steampunk — think Captain Nemo’s Nautilus.
- arborman
  
  I’m with the steampunk theme – if I ever get a gulfstream I want to make it look like the parlour of Sherlock Holmes.
  
  Of course, if I ever get a Gulfstream we’ll be in a post-civilization cannibalistic anarchy and we will have actually eaten the rich already. So I guess I probably shouldn’t hope for it to happen.
Anonymous

Please don’t show this stuff to our politicians in Italy !!
hassan-i-sabbah

Graceland Roccoco- now with wings!
Autumn72

What is the relation between dictators and science fiction art?
Could be an interesting study.
Anonymous

You can see from Image #7 that the plane in that picture has a map of Turkmenistan on the back wall. From that and the tasteful elegance on display here, I’m guessing it belonged to Turkmenbashi.
Anon, he must

I wonder what they smell like?
- ian71
  
  ‘d sy thy prbbly smll lk th cnts tht nhbt thm.
  - bklynchris
    
    @ian 71
    
    “I’d say they probably smell like the cunts that inhabit them.
    ‘
    
    Are you laying the groundwork for some racial epithets in later comments?
    
    Cause if you ain’t a cunt, you do not to get to throw down cunt. So, is you is, or is you ain’t a….woman?
- CaptObvious
  
  My guess is, anal lube and caviar
CaptObvious

This has inspired me to be the first person to fill a private jet with water ride a waverunner around inside.

I mean seriously, if you can afford a goddam airplane why WOULDN’T you be doing this to it.

I love the redundant (poster? painting?) of naked women on the wall. Because I’m sure if you are lying in that bed, there are actual naked women around.
- Nadreck
  
  I dunno if the pictures of naked women are redundant: maybe they’re instruction manuals – kind of like those old Fred Astaire Dancing School diagrams.
  - Felton
    
    I thought the sex instructions were printed on the back of the aircraft safety cards.
- Anonymous
  
  Waverunner in a jet:
  
  You might get a 60m run in a 747, so make the pool 5m wide and .5 m deep. That’s 150 tons, well within the cargo limit for the 747.
  
  If you can prevent sloshing, there’s no reason you couldn’t set up a temporary pool in a 747 cargo jet.
ZippySpincycle

Wow–That’s easily the weirdest combination of a relevant comment and straight-up spam that I’ve seen. I’m not sure whether to applaud or vomit.