The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

A collection of forty-five true-crime stories about the visual arts in Australia: art theft, art forgery, art censorship, art vandalism, and protest art. The title comes from the famous artnapping of Picasso's Weeping Woman from the National Gallery of Victoria. One of the artnapper's demands was an art prize called 'The Picasso Ransom'.

While that crime is famous, others stories of crimes, from the colonial to the contemporary, have faded from memory. Amongst them is the first break-in at the Adelaide Art Gallery, an entire exhibition of forged Pollocks, art prosecuted as pornography, decapitated statues, and burnt flags. There are great artists, including Renoir, Rover Thomas, Brett Whitely and Albert Tucker and some notorious criminals, including Murray Farquar, Steven Sellers, and Carl Williams.

It is based on extensive research in newspaper archives, observing trials, interviews, and decades of experience in the art world.

1143035098
The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

A collection of forty-five true-crime stories about the visual arts in Australia: art theft, art forgery, art censorship, art vandalism, and protest art. The title comes from the famous artnapping of Picasso's Weeping Woman from the National Gallery of Victoria. One of the artnapper's demands was an art prize called 'The Picasso Ransom'.

While that crime is famous, others stories of crimes, from the colonial to the contemporary, have faded from memory. Amongst them is the first break-in at the Adelaide Art Gallery, an entire exhibition of forged Pollocks, art prosecuted as pornography, decapitated statues, and burnt flags. There are great artists, including Renoir, Rover Thomas, Brett Whitely and Albert Tucker and some notorious criminals, including Murray Farquar, Steven Sellers, and Carl Williams.

It is based on extensive research in newspaper archives, observing trials, interviews, and decades of experience in the art world.

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The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

by Mark S. Holsworth
The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

The Picasso Ransom: and other stories about art and crime in Australia

by Mark S. Holsworth

eBook

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Overview

A collection of forty-five true-crime stories about the visual arts in Australia: art theft, art forgery, art censorship, art vandalism, and protest art. The title comes from the famous artnapping of Picasso's Weeping Woman from the National Gallery of Victoria. One of the artnapper's demands was an art prize called 'The Picasso Ransom'.

While that crime is famous, others stories of crimes, from the colonial to the contemporary, have faded from memory. Amongst them is the first break-in at the Adelaide Art Gallery, an entire exhibition of forged Pollocks, art prosecuted as pornography, decapitated statues, and burnt flags. There are great artists, including Renoir, Rover Thomas, Brett Whitely and Albert Tucker and some notorious criminals, including Murray Farquar, Steven Sellers, and Carl Williams.

It is based on extensive research in newspaper archives, observing trials, interviews, and decades of experience in the art world.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780646873084
Publisher: Mark S Holsworth
Publication date: 03/01/2023
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 314
File size: 3 MB

About the Author

Mark S. Holsworth is the author of Sculptures of Melbourne, the long-running blog Black Mark, articles, short stories, plays, and various hack writing jobs.

Table of Contents

Introduction - at the intersection of art and crime

Timeline of events

Part 1: Thieving ratbags

The abstraction at the Art Gallery

A swag of art thefts

La belle Holandaise

Artnapping

The Stolen exhibition

Sky Blue and Joseph Brown

Whose law? Whose culture?

Loti's Renoir

The Picasso ransom

Stolen art and the damage done

Australia's Most Wanted

Hot Tucker

The cleaner

Copper-belly

The Australia Day art heist

The gloaters

The worst art thief in Australia

Five-finger discounts 

The stolen gods

Part 2: Bullshit Artists

False Representations

Pro art forgers

A dealer in 'Drysdales'

The fake dripper

Blundell's innuendos

Faking Possum

The Toorak forgers

The art of investing

How to Frame a Brett Whiteley

Part 3: Self-righteous pricks

Norman Lindsey and the Witch of Kings Cross

The indecency of Mike Brown

Warning signs

Regional values

Trial by media

A troll in St. Kilda

Part 4: Bloody vandals

Stabbings in Melbourne 

Dickheads

Statue wars

Holy monkey thieves! 

Taggers, Renks and 70K

The ballad of Ether and Utah

Part 5: Other animals

The communist in a cage

Beverly's body

Proudly unAustralian

Courtroom artists

This is not a conclusion

Notes

From the B&N Reads Blog

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