Date toured: May 2007

Before I traveled to the 2007 Genoa charter show, I spent a day in Paris at three of the French capital’s finest museums. One is the George Pompidou Museum of Modern Art, where I was treated to works by Robert Delaunay, Mark Rothko and several more of my favorites, along with some bizarre audiovisual presentations and an airplane made of sticks and scissors that left me scratching my noggin. It was certainly an interesting day all around, and I thought it would be the last time I’d see contemporary pieces--which I truly appreciate--for several months.
That is, until two days later, when I arrived at the Genoa show and stepped onboard the 147-foot motoryacht Prometej. Part of the fleet at Ocean Independence, Prometej is an ice-breaking Romanian workboat commissioned in 1956 to patrol the Black and Baltic seas. She was gutted beginning in 2003 with a two-year interior refit by fashion designer Alberta Ferretti, who is not related to the Ferretti Group that builds sleek, sexy motoryachts in Italy.
In fact, Alberta Ferretti’s far different ideas about interior design were quite obvious from the moment I stepped onboard.
Entering Prometej’s main saloon (see photo above) was like stepping into the Pompidou Museum all over again—complete with oddly shaped furniture, neon installations and walls of fabric set beneath light intentionally set so dim, I had to squint to make out the texture of the cloth. Full-size modern art pieces are mixed with Indonesian furniture, particularly pieces done in Balinese style, inspired by the fact that much of the crew are Bali natives who offer massages and dance routines for charter guests.
This yacht is, without question, an anomaly on the world charter stage.
I was intrigued enough to photograph everything I saw and report it here on CharterWave for you to form your own opinions, but I must admit, I had absolutely no feeling of comfort on this yacht nor any desire to spend more than a few minutes passing through each room, just the way most people move from piece to piece at museums like the Pompidou. I do appreciate contemporary art and design, but when it’s taken to this degree, I’m of the opinion that it belongs in a city like Paris instead of at a marina dock.
The thing about a yacht like Prometej (which means "Goddess of Fire" in Croatian) is that she turns heads because she’s a bit bizarre, not because she’s designed to make charter guests comfortable.
Yes, by contrast, many yachts in this size range have standard or, dare I say, boring interiors that look alike—but that’s because builders and charter management companies have learned over the years that certain fabrics, styles and layouts make the best use of the available charter space in the harsh marine environment.
Furniture, for instance, is built with rounded corners because boats move and it hurts when you bang a kneecap into a square edge. Natural light is welcomed as often as possible because boats of all sizes are confined spaces where people can quickly feel claustrophobic (see the guest cabin photo below). Indoor dining rooms aren’t decorated with buzzing neon signs (see the middle photo on this page) because after a day or two of eating, that level of background noise will drive most people into a migraine.
A yacht like Prometej, therefore, is usually a flash in the pan in terms of charter, destined to be praised in architecture magazines and then gutted by the next owner who knows more about boats than artistic adventures. I’m told Prometej did two charters last year, one to a Russian group and another to an Italian party, but that there are many open weeks on the boat’s calendar for this summer in Croatia and Greece (no doubt because of the over-the-top décor, with no reflection at all on the crew's abilities).
Perhaps the artistic sensibilities of guests wanting to charter in Eastern Europe will be more in tune with Prometej than my American mind. The yacht’s lowest weekly base rate is 90,000 euros for 12 guests with nine crew, or about $12,600 per person with 25-percent expenses included.
Personally, I feel that I get more for my money with a 10-euro entrance ticket at the Pompidou.—Kim Kavin