A painting by famed Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, valued at more than $1 million, has sold for the price of a dinner in Paris.
Ari Hodara was the lucky winner of the “1 Picasso for 100 euros” raffle, which offered entrants the chance to take home Picasso’s 1941 gouache “Tête de Femme.” The price of a ticket was as the name of the contest suggests 100 euros, or about $117.
A total of 120,000 tickets were available and proceeds will be donated to the Alzheimer’s Research Foundation, which supports clinical research into the disease across Europe.
Hodara, who bought winning ticket number 94715 last weekend, is an art lover from Paris who works selling software. Learning he now owns a Picasso came as quite the surprise. “How can I check this isn’t a hoax?” he asked over the phone when Péri Cochin, one of the raffle’s organizers, told him of the result during the live-streamed event.
She switched to video call and revealed the audience.
“Can you be unhappy about winning a Picasso? No, I don’t think so,” Hodara said, laughing.
“When she called I thought it was fake, it was phishing,” he told CNN Wednesday, referring to the call from Cochin.
“I was very, very surprised, very emotional,” he added. “It’s a dream, I never thought I’d own a Picasso. It’s not within my means. Normally I’d only see them in a museum.”
Hodara said he hadn’t yet decided whether to try to keep the work at home eventually. For now, though, it’s going to stay firmly in the vault of Christie’s, the auction house that hosted the raffle.
This is the third edition of the campaign. The first “1 Picasso for 100 euros” was held in 2013, with funds donated to the preservation of Tyre, a historic city in Southern Lebanon. A second edition in 2020 supported clean water and hygiene programs during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Olivier Widmaier Picasso, grandson of the legendary Spanish artist, told CNN’s Paula Newton ahead of the event that his grandfather created “Tête de Femme” in the same studio where he painted his masterpiece “Guernica.”
He said he believed the work is being undervalued. “It’s worth much more than $1 million,” Widmaier Picasso said, “so it will be really a big prize.”
Picassos have fetched staggering sums at auction in the past. “Les Femmes d’Alger (Version ‘O’)” sold for more than $179 million in 2015.
The Opera Gallery, which donated the painting, says Pablo Picasso was in Paris when he painted “Tête de Femme.” World War II was raging across Europe and much of France was under German occupation.
“Tête de Femme” is about 15 inches tall and 10 inches wide. The woman’s expression, painted in different shades of gray, is intentionally distorted in Picasso’s signature Cubist style. The Opera Gallery says the gouache reflects a moment of introspection and concentrated studio work for the artist.
Widmaier Picasso says that a friend of his came up with the “1 Picasso for 100 euros” initiative.
“She thought it was a modern vision of charity by offering people the option to get a real artwork of my grandfather and to participate in humanitarian operations,” he said.
Widmaier Picasso believes his grandfather would support “1 Picasso for 100 euros.”
“My grandfather was a pioneer in many ways,” he said. “I think that he was always very interested in participating in new things. I would say that today he would have been interested in video or maybe in artificial intelligence.”
Widmaier Picasso had said whoever won “Tête de Femme” would be free to do whatever they would like with it. The winner of the first contest, for example, decided to display their prize in a museum.
“Anyone can do what they want,” he added. “They can keep it in the living room, they can show it in an exhibition — or they can resell it.”
Widmaier Picasso said his grandfather would agree with letting the winner decide, because that’s how he operated.
He said his grandmother, Marie-Thérèse Walter, who was only 17 years old when Picasso began a romantic relationship with her, was showered with art. The artist was in his mid-forties at the time, married with a young son.
Marie-Thérèse Walter’s features appeared in Picasso’s work over the next decade. Widmaier Picasso says his grandfather repaid her for the years of inspiration.
“When my grandfather was giving artworks, it was forever,” he said. “It was a decision – you do what you want with it. Pablo gave a lot of artworks to his lady, and she kept everything until she died. So I’m offering all options.”
