Imagine this: A valuable Picasso sculpture disappears overnight, then turns up as an ‘unknown female bust’ in a castle moat - and nobody recognises it. This is exactly what happened in Paris, and the story behind it is even more astonishing.
It all begins with a love story. Pablo Picasso, who lived in his studio at number 7 Rue des Grands-Augustin - the same place where he created his famous ‘Guernica’ (1937) - had a fascinating muse: Henriette Theodora Markovitch. Under the name Dora Maar (1907-1997), she was not only his companion from 1935 to 1943, but also a remarkable artist in her own right - a photographer and painter.
In 1941, in the middle of occupied Paris, Picasso immortalised her features in bronze. The bust, which was later named ‘La Poésie’, was to become a memorial to his friend, the poet Guillaume Apollinaire. Today it stands - or rather, stands again - next to the oldest church in Paris, the abbey church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés on the Square Laurent-Prache.
The first inauguration on 5 June 1959 could not have been more dramatic: While André Salmon and Jean Cocteau solemnly attended the ceremony, André Breton suddenly stormed the event with a group of angry surrealists. The reason? A long-standing artistic and political feud with Cocteau. Picasso himself and the new Minister of Culture, André Malraux, preferred to stay away from the chaos.
But the real drama only began 40 years later, on the night of 30 to 31 March 1999, when the bronze statue disappeared without a trace. Weeks later, however, someone makes a strange discovery: a mysterious bust of a woman lies in the ditches of the small forest of La Garenne, above Grouchy Castle, fifty kilometres from Paris.
What happens next borders on the absurd: the town hall reports the find to the Drac (the regional directorate for cultural affairs) in accordance with regulations - but nobody thinks that it could be the stolen Picasso. Instead, the bust is displayed like an ordinary decorative piece on the grand staircase at the main entrance to the castle until February 2001. People walk past it every day without realising what a treasure they are looking at.
The solution ultimately comes from the artist Ange Tomaselli. With a trained eye, he recognises the unmistakable signature of the Catalan master in the nameless bust. On 17 December 2001, ‘La Poésie’ finally returns home, to the Square Laurent-Prache.
This story raises fascinating questions: How could a work by Picasso remain unrecognised for so long? Who were the thieves and why did they simply dispose of the valuable statue in the woods? And perhaps most astonishing of all: how many masterpieces are still somewhere unrecognised today, waiting to be rediscovered?
Literature
Brassaï (2023): Gespräche mit Picasso. – Kampa Verlag.
Clemenz-Kirsch, Gertraude (2023): Die Picasso-Bande der Pariser Avantgarde: Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob und Jean Cocteau. – Morio Verlag.
Olivier, Fernande (1989): Picasso und seine Freunde: Erinnerungen aus den Jahren 1905–1913. – Diogenes Verlag.
Roe, Sue (2014): In Montmartre: Picasso, Matisse and Modernism in Paris, 1900-1910. – Fig Tree.
Rowley, Neville / Birmant, Julie / Oubrerie, Clément (2014): Pablo, le Paris. – Dargoud.
Schlesser, Gilles (2022): Picasso à Paris. – Parigramme.
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