Pablo Picasso paintings can be expensive. One sold at an auction in 2023 for $139.4 million. Another sold in 2015 for $179.4 million.
So when Ari Hodara, a 58-year-old software salesman from Paris, saw an opportunity to win a Picasso for the price of a $118 charity raffle ticket, he bought two.
On Tuesday, forgetting the day of the drawing, he received a confusing phone call that he first thought was a phishing scam: He had won.
“I was surprised,” Hodara said in an interview. “I’m not a gambler, so I didn’t expect to win. It was just for fun.”
The painting Hodara will receive, “Tête de femme,” is worth more than one million euros, or roughly $1.2 million. It was completed in 1941 and once hung in the artist’s home, according to Péri Cochin, the founder of the French charity 1 Picasso for 100 Euros.
The charity raised 12 million euros in the raffle, which had participants from dozens of countries. One million will cover the cost of the painting and the rest will be given to the Alzheimer’s Research Foundation, which raises money for clinical research programs, funds doctoral and postdoctoral fellowships and promotes the sharing of research.
Giving money to Alzheimer’s research was a worthy cause, Hodara said, and winning the painting also aligned with his interest in art.
“I have some paintings, but not like a Picasso,” he said, adding that his collection includes about 10 works. “Picasso represents something incredible for me and for everybody.”
The black, brown and gray portrait, which measures 15.3 inches by 10 inches, is of Dora Maar, Picasso’s muse, lover and model for many of his portraits of women, Cochin said. Maar was also a recognized photographer and celebrated Surrealist.
Cochin said the painting was quintessential Picasso.
“It’s completely Cubist period,” she said. “It’s a very, very beautiful and strong portrait of her.”
Olivier Picasso, Pablo Picasso’s grandson, told The New York Times in December that the portrait was painted during a difficult patch in his grandfather’s marriage to Olga Khokhlova, noting that the dark colors reflected his grandfather’s unhappiness at that time.
The painting was previously owned by Opera Gallery, which has several locations around the world; the Picasso Estate and Christie’s were also partners in the raffle.
Cochin said she chose to raffle this particular work because of its price and subject matter, adding that some other available works did not portray ideas she wanted to promote. The painting is in good condition, she said, and was ready to hang.
This is the third raffle organized by 1 Picasso for 100 Euros. In 2020, an Italian man won after buying a ticket for his mother as a Christmas gift. Seven years earlier, a 25-year-old Pennsylvania man named Jeffrey Gonano won a Picasso work on paper.
“It’s just been in storage since, I haven’t seen it in over 10 years,” Gonano, now 38, recently said by phone. The Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh initially accepted the painting on his behalf and it was then sent off to Manhattan, where Christie’s stores and insures it, he said.
Gonano’s Picasso, “L’Homme au Gibus,” was completed more than a century ago. “You can’t really keep it on display,” he said, adding that the piece was delicate and sensitive to light. “I think you can only have it on display like six weeks out of the year.”
Gonano said he had no current plans for the painting but would consider selling it if he received a “crazy offer.” He does, however, daydream about bringing it home.
“Maybe technology will advance enough where I can somehow store it in my house without it deteriorating,” he said.
For security reasons, Hodara has not decided whether to bring home his Picasso. “Sometimes not everybody has a good mind about that,” he said, pointing to its value, “so I’m a little bit nervous about it.”
Derrick Bryson Taylor is a Times reporter covering breaking news in culture and the arts.
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