Posted on 10/17/2006 9:01:12 PM PDT by verum ago
Pablo Picasso's "dream" painting has turned into a $139 million nightmare for Steve Wynn.
In an accident witnessed by a group that included Barbara Walters and screenwriters Nora Ephron and Nicholas Pileggi, Wynn accidentally poked a hole in Picasso's 74-year-old painting, "Le Reve," French for "The Dream."
A day earlier, Wynn had finalized a record $139 million deal for the painting of Picasso's mistress, Wynn told The New Yorker magazine
The accident occurred as a gesturing Wynn, who suffers from retinitis pigmentosa, an eye disease that affects peripheral vision, struck the painting with his right elbow, leaving a hole the size of a silver dollar in the left forearm of Marie-Theresa Walter, Picasso's 21-year-old mistress.
"Oh shit, look what I've done," Wynn said, according to Ephron, who gave her account in a blog published on Monday.
Wynn paid $48.4 million for the Picasso in 1997 and had agreed to sell it to art collector Steven Cohen. The $139 million would have been $4 million higher than the previous high for a work of art, according to The New Yorker.
Cosmetics magnate Ronald Lauder paid $135 million in July for Gustav Klimt's 1907 portrait "Adele Bloch-Bauer I."
Wynn plans to restore "Le Reve" and keep it.
I wonder if Rowan Atkinson did the improved face on Whistler's Mother by himself.
Thanks. I will look through that site you posted. I have to admit though that I would enjoy a classic car show, an NFL game or even a good technologies discussion a lot more than an art museum.
Modern art is trash (excepting Dali, but that is my peculiar fancy). Modern music (art song) is trash. Modern theatre, so far as I am conversant with it, is trash. Anyone who would pay more than a day's wages for any of it (including Dali) is a fool
I didn't mean to imply he was beyond criticism. And my praise was perhaps a bit too strong: I looked through some of his works again and there are some I don't particularly care for. But then again, very few people can produce very many great works of significance in any field without an occasional work that isn't so great. And even the works of Bouguereau that I don't particularly like aren't really bad--I just don't like them.
Sometimes Bouguereau's lighting isn't perfect, though it can be hard to tell looking at a computer picture of a hundred-year-old painting what the real thing looked like when painted. Looking through a bunch of his paintings, the lighting isn't consistently better on indoor poses than outdoor ones; there are some lighting miscues on both. Nonetheless, there is something about many of his paintings that is simply indescribably marvelous.
Beat me to it, I was Googling to find the pic of the same...
Put some ice on that.
is a Pud another name for a male private part?
That is remarkable eye work you have.
Also look at the man face down in the blue waters of her breasts.
What was Picasso abstracting about?
"is a Pud another name for a male private part? "
Yes.
I have heard of sh!t for brains, but d!ck for brains? Now, that's a new one!
"As someone who thinks that paying more than $100 for a work of art is absurd, I find this story hilarious."
I feel sorry for you.
Great question.
Oh man do I agree. I've seen works done by elephants and chickens and 3 yr old kids that had more interest than these million dollar(s) "master pieces". Some folk will do anything to gain that ellusive "position" among peers. Nonsense. Do some real good with that money and help some people who are hungry, cold or sick. Then you really have something worthwhile.
"I get to see the Picasso monstrosity in downtown Chicago and realize the guy was playing a joke on the city."
LOL! I saw it about 2 weeks after it was put up and when I've described it to people I've used the same words as you do.
A properly done relining or patch will fix the hole. Whether or not a blending touch-up or a neutral tone on the damaged area (to show that a repair has been done) is done will depend on the professional art restorer's philosophy.
We've repaired paintings that movers had impaled with a forklift, a child had throw a ball at and an angry ex-wife had knifed. That one was a little scary.
Or you could put plate glass over it with an ashtray hole right over the tear and make it a table top. You could even put similar holes in other places on the canvas to make it look intentional and give it more of a 3D effect. Simpler still, you could stitch up the tear in her arm and rename the painting, "Arm Surgery." A clod like Wynn wouldn't know the difference anyway.
I used to absolutely hate Picasso and Pollack, because I thought they had no talent. Then I saw their early work and realized that they both could actually paint. Their "earlier" drawings and sketches show that they could actually draw the human form, and very well. I do not like their later work, because I think it is quite childish. It's for cretinous art patrons who just want a name to hang on their walls.
But is someone a fool when he invests $48 million, simply waits 9 years, and then realizes a gross profit of $90 million on that investment? That's $10 million a year, just for sitting on his keister. It's no different than flipping a piece of real estate.
I'd say he's "drowning in a sea of love" -- and judging by his pallor, he's also suffering acute milk poisoning.
Good observation.
If it wasn't for Beagle8U honest observation I would have never gone back and seen these things.
Interesting.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.