Two paintings attributed to Pablo Picasso and hanging in Hobart’s acclaimed MONA are fake and were “created” by the museum owner’s wife.
Kirsha Kaechele revealed in a blog post Wednesday that she made the paintings because she couldn’t get a real Picasso to match the green theme of the museum’s now-closed Women’s Room.
“I wanted the room to be monochromatic,” the artist and curator wrote on Mona’s website.
‘I also had time against me, not to mention the cost of insuring a Picasso: exorbitant!
‘A few days later, I was having drinks with my friend Natalie. ‘Maybe I should do the paintings myself,’ I said. We laughed. How absurd!
“But then, as with many absurd ideas, I decided it was a good one.”
Ms Kaechele added that the paintings were created almost four years ago and she waited for them to “explode” and be exhibited, “but that didn’t” happen.
Ms Kaechele had previously claimed the paintings were inherited from her great-grandmother, who knew the 20th-century Spanish artist, who died in 1973.
Kirsha Kaechele poses for a photo with one of the alleged Picassos
Ms. Kaechele is pictured on the left.
One of the works on display at the Museum of Old and New Art is his version of Picasso’s Luncheon on the Grass, after Manet, which he saw exhibited in Paris. The other is entitled Reclining Nude.
She also revealed that several other pieces in the Ladies’ Salon were not authentic, including a mink rug “made” by Princess (now Queen) Mary of Denmark’s furrier and spears presented as antiques collected by her grandfather.
MONA’s Ladies’ Lounge made headlines earlier this year when the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal found it discriminatory after a Sydney man complained he had been denied entry to the exhibition.
In April, the court ruled that MONA had 28 days to stop denying entry to the salon to people who did not identify as women.
After its closure, the fake Picassos were moved to a women’s bathroom so they could be legally displayed to the female public.
The fake Picassos were moved inside a bathroom stall.
It’s not real: the other Picasso, above
Ms Kaechele, wife of MONA’s millionaire owner David Walsh, announced in May that the gallery had appealed to the Tasmanian Supreme Court.
The salon housed some of the gallery’s most important works, including one by Sidney Nolan, and female attendants were served by male butlers.