Picasso was suspected of stealing the 'Mona Lisa'
newyorker.com90 points by bookofjoe 6 months ago
90 points by bookofjoe 6 months ago
> Both men start crying like little boys, and change their stories so many times that the magistrate quickly realizes that they have nothing to do with the stolen painting. Both are soon released.
I would have expected that behavior to make them seem guilty enough to warrant holding them until their stories are thoroughly examined.
Presumably there was more than the few days that the comic hints at, between the theft and them getting caught, thus the magistrate probably thought they were so terrible at being deceptful or keeping a story straight, that there was no way they'd not have been caught the same day as the theft.
Or to put it another way, it was a different, simpler time.
Shakespearean actor, mountaineer and explorer BRIAN BLESSED has a brilliant story about the time, as a young boy, he met Picasso and narrowly avoided saving his family from poverty: https://youtu.be/ZH4cWoetw4s?si=CjLg5P5MDrlqNFpU&t=1352
The part where Pablo Picasso and Guillaume Apolliniare attempt to throw the ancient sculptures they have stolen from the Louvre into the Seine because they are scared of getting caught stealing them...
After learning of this, I now value Pablo Picasso (the person) somewhat differently. He was ~26 in 1907. Not a kid.
This probably explains why e.g. I had never heard of this before: https://jacobin.com/2023/06/pablo-picasso-brooklyn-museum-ga...
"great artists steal" (attributed to Picasso) after all!
Great point.
Of course, mere copying is vastly different from copying plus theft and attempted burying/hiding of the original [inspiration].
> The part where Pablo Picasso and Guillaume Apolliniare attempt to throw the ancient sculptures they have stolen from the Louvre into the Seine because they are scared of getting caught stealing them...
Planning to do something bad and not following through is not the same thing as doing the bad thing.
(What mixture of it was conscience, and what mixture was fear of getting caught?)
No, not planning; attempting but failing. You didn't look at all of the eh, article.
I did look at the "article", and I've looked at the way the event has been described in other sources. I double checked before I responded to you, too.
In the end, we'll never know why they didn't dump the suitcase in the river.
> > (What mixture of it was conscience, and what mixture was fear of getting caught?)
"They decide to put the sculptures in a suitcase and drop it in the Seine. *They wander the streets all night but never find the right moment to do so*."
What does "never find the right moment to do so" mean?
As posited above: because of conscience?
Because of fear of getting caught dropping a suitcase?
And, of course, I suggest one go to more primary sources. The only one we really have is Fernande Olivier, who said (translation):
> After a hastily swallowed dinner and a long evening’s wait, they set out on foot around midnight with the suitcase; at two in the morning they were back, worn out and still carrying the suitcase with the statues inside.
> They had wandered the streets never finding the right moment, never daring to get rid of the suitcase. They thought they were being followed and conjured up in imagination a thou sand possibilities. . . . Although I shared their fears, I had been watching them rather closely that night. I am sure that perhaps involuntarily they had been play-acting a little: to such a point that, while waiting for “the moment of the crime,” although neither of them knew how, they had pretended to play cards—doubtless in imitation of certain bandits they had read about. In the end Apollinaire spent the night at Picasso’s and went the next morn ing to Paris-Journal, where he turned in the undesirable statues under a pledge of secrecy.
I read in all of these sources a lot of ambiguity about why they didn't. You find certainty, perhaps-- I don't.
> You find certainty, perhaps
I don’t think that’s the case, at least for me.
It is more that they even thought this is an okay thing to do makes them moraly suspect in my eyes. Doesn’t matter if they went through with it or not. Doesn’t matter why they haven’t gone through with it either.
They should have told the person offering to steal a statue that he shouldn’t. And when he shows up with a statue they should have told him that he should bring it back or they are calling the police. And when he brought the second statue they should have called the police instead of paying for it. And then every single day the statue was on his mantle piece he should have returned it safely. Same as when things got too hot for them. Instead they decided to destroy them.
These are all facts which put them in rather bad light. By that point they were already miles deep into bad decisions. And, none of them even asked “what if we just leave this suitcase with a sign which says ‘to the police’?” But somehow i should care weather they didn’t go through with destroying the statues out of cowardice or consciousness? Even if it is consciousness it is too little too late for me.
> It is more that they even thought this is an okay thing to do makes them moraly suspect in my eyes.
Maybe you don't seriously consider doing really bad things, and even take steps playing with the idea of doing them. I definitely have, especially when I was younger.
> They should have told the person offering to steal a statue that he shouldn’t. And when he shows up with a statue they should have told him that he should bring it back or they are calling the police. And when he brought the second statue they should have called the police instead of paying for it. And then every single day the statue was on his mantle piece he should have returned it safely.
Sure, stealing things is bad.
> And, none of them even asked “what if we just leave this suitcase with a sign which says ‘to the police’?”
Actually, they handed them to the police through a newspaper. That's what they actually did! So clearly they asked it at some point ;)
> Maybe you don't seriously consider doing really bad things, and even take steps playing with the idea of doing them. I definitely have, especially when I was younger.
There was a lot more there just "considering". If they just had a night chatting about the state of museum security that would have been "consider doing really bad things" and "take steps playing with the idea of doing them".
Certainly not kids, but then also men only reach maturity around 30 years old (around 25 for women).
How are you operationalizing "maturity", and what data supports your conclusion of ages for reaching this maturity? Typically studies of brain myelination, which is often used as marker for "maturity", show a linear progression until about 30 without a significant difference across sex or gender. However, they are usually quick to point out that myelination does not necessarily equal cognitive, emotional, and social maturity.
The poet Guillaume Apollinaire was also arrested on suspicion of this theft.
He wrote a poem about the experience of being jailed:
https://allpoetry.com/poem/14329550---La-Sant--by-Guillaume-...
I think “La Santé” was the name of the prison. The English translation of the title loses this double meaning.
I'm not that good with French, but verse IV appears to be about guards pissing in the next cell.
La Fontaine, I think, was the title of Marcel Duchamp's urinal installation; I suspect it might be a common euphemism?
Sentenced to 1 year and 15 days for stealing the Mona Lisa, what a laughable punishment compared to today’s standards.(also, Picasso was accused and never convicted, Vincenzo Peruggia was the actual thief that was convicted)
I don't think it then had the near-mythic reverence it now commands, and the theft was partly responsible for bringing its current status about.
And to be clear, Peruggia was sentenced to that time. Picasso was never sentenced.
Today's standards are indeed different: if rich or famous enough, you can commit dozens of felonies, receive no prison time or other actual punishment, and be sworn in as president!
> Today's standards are indeed different
The rulers of yesteryear are surely grateful that, in time, even the worst sins get washed away.
"Politicians used to be honorable" must be as commonly said across generations as "kids these days are just so disrespectful".
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New York convicted him for his pre-presidential criminal activity documented in paperwork. It has nothing to do with his criminality as president.
Dozens of felony convictions, the jury agreed with the prosecution.
Lying under oath was also what got Bill Clinton impeached, and that too is "just words".
That said, the claim that this unduly influenced the previous election is, IMO, probably incorrect: that Trump is a philanderer was known in 2016, and his conviction for these offences was known by the 2024 election, and yet he still won.
AIUI Bill Clinton did not lie:
The way I heard it, the government used a specific language for "have sexual relations with" (hereinafter HSRW):
A HSRW B if the mouth, hands, or genitals of A touch the genitals of B.
Any hackernews regular would notice that HSRW is not associative - as in it is entirely possible for A HSRW B to be true, but B HSRW A to be false; in fact this was the case for if A's mouth touches B's genitals; A HSRW B but !(B HSRW A).
You can whine and plead and ask the question 4,000 times, but at the end of the day, if one don't understand logic, you might be a Republican Senator in the 1990's.
Clinton's claim was effectively that he believed the definition was not associative for that specific statement. There was also the later statement which he described Monica's statement about having not had a sexual relationship as true.
The trial court disagreed that these statements truthfully responded to the deposition, and fined him for his misleading answer.
You know in the 'bad guy countries' where political enemies are imprisoned by the political establishment? They also still generally hold trials for them, and convict them, while still offering them the rights and liberties afforded to any other defendant.
For instance in Russia, their Supreme Court actually threw out the first conviction of Navalny on embezzlement charges. The local case itself was a shit show, but what else would you call a conviction in a case based largely on the words of a serial liar of undoubtedly near zero character, who also had a financial and vindictive motivation to lie? And I'm not talking about Navalny's case there, but imagine I was. Your opinion should not change if you're being logically consistent.
This is the reason that these trials sent Trump's popularity surging, and very possibly being the reason he won the popular vote. It seems that not only were they shit shows, but because they are seen as being motivated by the person being charged, rather than by the acts alleged.
FWIW, this does not mean he's innocent. It just means that if he wasn't who he is, none of these cases, all launched just in time to try to interfere with the election, would have happened.
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One of the fastest examples of Godwin’s law I’ve seen
The trouble with avoiding Hitler analogies because of Godwin's law is that it allows the particularly cynical to emulate Hitler and avoid criticism.
Why would he steal his own painting?
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Not just that, but a community in the early 1900s...? before communism was even attempted at large scale? you don't have the "it's been tried and it didn't work" excuse to criticize him for.
He was a Communist until his death in the 1970s, but Communism is a pretty broad spectrum and his beliefs moved about it during his life. His public and financial support for Stalinism in France until the mid-1950s was a bad error of judgement.
I saw the idea more as a reflection of a contradiction within his traits, which is also a common human characteristic. Regarding the ‘-isms’ it’s worth noting that nearly all intellectuals associated with Surrealism leaned towards the left wing. A notable exception is Dalí, who was mocked with the ‘Avido Dollars’ anagram.
Dali was a fascist who hits women
Vice article brain,, all the “stories” of Dali hitting women were written,, by Dali himself, notably the case in which a woman enraged him by calling his feet beautiful
There are all combinations of people, what is special/different in Dali comparing to almost all people is that he said that himself about the violence to some women.
How can one “be a communist” when the entire idea is predicated on a small central authority telling the rest of the country what to do and how to do it?
Or did you mean “one of the small ruling elite” communists?
> the entire idea
That's absolutely not "the entire idea" of communism. There's this idea of, you know... communes.
What? Central/eastern Europe than remembers communism definitely considers communists bad people.
Most people from eastern Europe agree that communists should not be treated differently than Nazis.
Which is a completely stupid idea, and that's a hill I'm willing to die on.
Nazism is intrinsically violent and atrocious. Communism has been the excuse that made it possible for terrible dictators to commit mass-scale atrocities, but nothing in the writings of Marx encourages those atrocities.
The whole "communism is just as bad as nazism" is a trope that needs to die already. Stalin was bad. His entourage was bad. A group of peasants who want to collectivize their work tools are not bad, have never been, and never will be.
Then why did all of the other countries that try it also commit mass murder and conduct struggle sessions, etc.? Nazism and Communism are extremely different, but both fundamentally involve dehumanizing entire groups of people based on identities- which makes violent atrocities inevitable.
I do not think Marx intended to justify violent atrocities at all, but unknown to him they logically follow from his philosophy, and are essential for putting it into practice. It is the most awful philosophical trap in human history: one where people with compassion, a sense of justice, and a desire to make the world better end up sucked into a bad idea that inevitably turns out horrific.
For the same reason that capitalism also developed by means of violent atrocities, genocide and murder. And it also would do all this again whenever this is needed to maintain itself, so any competing system would need to defend itself in acts that would be portrayed as authoritarian and violent in capitalist societies, even if these societies handwave and find excuses for the same acts if done in capitalism. This is part of the power struggle inherent to the economical system.
I completely disagree- Marxism frames the situation that way, but it is completely mistaken about the reason for the awful acts it is trying to prevent, and therefore takes actions that aren't helpful. This battle isn't between capitalism vs marxism, but two sides actually mostly independent and orthogonal to that.
Marx saw a really real and awful injustice in how workers were treated during the industrial revolution, but he fundamentally misdiagnosed and misunderstood the problem. People were being awful and exploiting others for their own gain under inhumane conditions, because they simply were awful people that dehumanized others and only cared about themselves- and they were in a cultural and legal framework that encouraged and allowed that sort of behavior. It had absolutely nothing to do with capitalism, owning property, or owning a business, but more to do with an ancient medieval ethics that had been around long before capitalism, suddenly being applied with more powerful tools and systems.
As an aside, I think Pirsig's "Metaphysics of Quality" gets directly at what the real problem is that leads to the atrocities Marx was concerned about. People that are exploiting others in that way- and the people that tolerate/allow it- aren't capitalists per say, but are lacking a sense of what Pirsig calls Quality.
Since communism side-steps the real issue, it creates a new framework where the same type of awful people have even more power to abuse, exploit, and dehumanize others - even while feeling righteous about it, rather than at least a bit guilty like one would hope they would feel.
Our actual current modern society has more correctly diagnosed and solved the problem with new ethical, cultural, and legal norms about how one can and should treat other people, and the natural environment... while still keeping it perfectly legal to start a business, own property, etc. - those are simply amoral activities that have nothing to do with the atrocities Marx was trying to prevent. Plenty of people start and run a business, e.g. with the intention of being socially and environmentally responsible, and doing something helpful and useful with their lives by employing people and solving useful problems- and succeed at it.
A group of peasants or workers who own their farm or factory don't call themselves communists, and operate perfectly well within purely capitalist framework. They buy and sell what they want on the open market and use the same capitalist legal system.
Whereas people who call themselves communists, without exception, go to defend one of dozens bloodiest and nastiest regimes to ever exist. If an ideology brings sociopathic butchers to power not once not twice, but every single time, it's a good time to realize there is something deeply wrong with it.
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Picasso has been characterised as a womaniser and a misogynist
Enjoyable news format; the drawings are a bit crude, not that much considering we're talking about Picasso, but it's more pleasant to read, on a screen, than pure text.