As an update to an earlier post featured on the Art Law Blog relating to a dispute between the Gagosian Gallery and Qatar Royal Family's Agent over the ownership of Pablo Picasso's plaster "Bust of a Woman" sculpture, it has been reported this week that a settlement was reached between the parties.
Details of the settlement were not disclosed in a filing earlier this week in New York federal court, so it remains a secret as to who now owns the 1931 prized Picasso sculpture of the artist's then French muse/mistress,Marie-Thérèse Walter.
The sculpture was considered a treasured possession of Picasso's daughter, Maya Widmaier Picasso, who was born from the artist's affair with Walter.
As blog readers may recall, prominent New York art gallery owner Larry Gagosian claimed that he had agreed to purchase the sculpture for $106 million in 2015 to resell it to a then undisclosed New York art collector who has since been identified as New York billionaire Leon Black. However, an agent for the Qatar Royal Family claimed that they had already consummated a deal in 2014 to purchase the sculpture for 38 million euros (about $47.4 million at time of sale) from Widmaier Picasso through a transaction that was negotiated by her son.
Both sides had filed lawsuits earlier this year in New York federal court in Manhattan. In a three-paragraph order that had issued on Monday, the U.S. District Judge William Pauley ruled: "It having been reported to this court that these actions have been or will be settled, these actions are discontinued without costs to any party." Pursuant to the order, either party can request the court to reopen the dispute within 30 days.
The cases are Gagosian Gallery Inc. v. Pelham Europe Ltd., and Pelham Europe Ltd. v. Gagosian, 16-cv-00214 U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).
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