‘Fraud’ or fun? MONA displays Picasso fakes for three years

Tasmania’s Museum of Old and New Art has revealed it has been fooling the world — ‘Picasso’ paintings it has displayed for three years are fakes.

Artist and Mona curator Kirsha Kaechele has admitted she has faked three Picasso paintings hanging in the museum for the past three years. Picture: mona

Fun or fraud? Tasmania’s Museum of Old and New Art has revealed it has been fooling the world — ‘Picasso’ paintings it has displayed for three years are fakes.

A clue could have been locations for the three works: initially MONA’s “ladies’ lounge” – a women’s-only space since shut down by a discrimination ruling – and then a women’s toilet.

Their real creator has now been disclosed as artist Kirsha Kaechele, the flamboyant and provocative wife of wealthy gallery owner and professional gambler David Walsh.

“Three years ago I fantasised there would be a scandal: ‘Fake Picassos Exposed: Art Fraud!’,” Kaechele explained in a statement posted on MONA’s website.

“I imagined that a Picasso scholar, or maybe just a Picasso fan, or maybe just someone who Googles things, would visit the Ladies Lounge and see that the painting was upside down and expose me on social media.”

Instead, she said travel and art writers from the BBC to New York Times took them for real, as they lapped up the provocation of displaying Picasso’s Luncheon on the Grass, After Manet (1961) in a glorified dunny.

Views appear mixed on whether it is just a bit of fun or verging on fraud.

Artist and Mona curator Kirsha Kaechele has admitted she has faked three Picasso paintings hanging in the museum for the past three years. Picture: mona

At times, Kaechele has referred to them as “Picassos”, and has boasted about persuading some people they were given to her great-grandmother, who she claimed had been a lover of Picasso’s.

On other occasions, the artist has been more careful, describing the loo-adorning paintings as “demonstrating the genius of Picasso”, rather than as Picassos.

Kaechele said she decided to create “faux” Picassos, rather than use real ones, to match the Ladies Lounge décor.

“I knew of a number of Picasso paintings I could borrow from friends, but none of them were green and I wished for the Lounge to be monochrome,” she said. “I also had time working 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 just make the paintings myself,’ I said. We laughed — how absurd. But then, as with many absurd ideas, I decided it was a good one.

“So I made the artworks, quite painstakingly, with my own hands and the (perfectly shellacked) hands of my manicurist’s niece, who is far more competent in pen and ink and thus assisted with the etching.”

In response to Mona Ladies Lounge closure, the art gallery puts up a Picasso in its first female-only toilets. Picture: Instagram/Kirsha Kaechele

The art gallery put up a Picasso in its first female-only toilets. Picture: Instagram/Kirsha Kaechele

Kaechele said she had since “amassed” a “genuine collection of Picasso ceramics” for MONA. “In fact, all of my acquisitions for Mona to date have been (real) Picassos,” she said.

“Which presents a problem. How does one justify simultaneously showing real and faux Picassos? It’s one thing to have fabricated objects in a room as part of a conceptual artwork where everything is fake.

“But to then display real ones in another part of the museum … It’s complicated. That’s life art for you. Complex. And understanding is elusive.”

It remains to be seen whether or not the Picasso Administration, which had rumbled her, writing to politely seek an explanation, is quite so understanding.