Picasso was suspected of stealing the 'Mona Lisa'
63 comments
·January 7, 2025kmoser
> 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.
NikkiA
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.
cjs_ac
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
lysace
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...
pbhjpbhj
"great artists steal" (attributed to Picasso) after all!
lysace
Great point.
Of course, mere copying is vastly different from copying plus theft and attempted burying/hiding of the original [inspiration].
mlyle
> 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?)
lysace
No, not planning; attempting but failing. You didn't look at all of the eh, article.
mlyle
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?)
BlueTemplar
Certainly not kids, but then also men only reach maturity around 30 years old (around 25 for women).
technothrasher
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.
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pavlov
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.
pbhjpbhj
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?
Willingham
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)
mannykannot
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.
nguyenkien
Have you consider living conditions in prison from that time?
amelius
You can use the walls as your canvas.
whimsicalism
i think most people nowadays would make the trade
treetalker
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!
gottorf
> 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".
Willingham
Thanks, I updated the response (:
imchillyb
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kevin_thibedeau
New York convicted him for his pre-presidential criminal activity documented in paperwork. It has nothing to do with his criminality as president.
ben_w
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.
fredfoo
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mistercheph
Why would he steal his own painting?
narag
...
Biganon
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dev1ycan
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.
stg22
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.
wslh
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.
aloisdg
Dali was a fascist who hits women
dgfitz
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?
Biganon
> the entire idea
That's absolutely not "the entire idea" of communism. There's this idea of, you know... communes.
kolinko
What? Central/eastern Europe than remembers communism definitely considers communists bad people.
golergka
Most people from eastern Europe agree that communists should not be treated differently than Nazis.
Biganon
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.
visarga
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aloisdg
Picasso has been characterised as a womaniser and a misogynist
mbivert
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.
https://archive.ph/yji3I