How far would you go to get back at your ex? A Wall Street banker valued at $2.5 billion flailed in the wrath of his ex-wife.
When you’re as wealthy as Bill (AKA 'The King of Bonds') and Sue Gross, dividing assets at the end of a marriage can be decided by a quick, pain-free coin toss. Or so they thought. In their multi-million dollar divorce, it was Sue who triumphed in this game of heads and tails and walked away with a 1932 Picasso that had hung in the couple's bedroom. However, unlike her ex, she hadn’t left this toss to chance, reports Page Six.
Fittingly, the painting in question, called La Repos, reflects the artist’s own marital troubles. But, Bill, wouldn’t find out the depth of its allegory until he tried to honour their pact. For, Sue had taken a brush to canvas and recreated in painstaking detail her own amateur version of Picasso’s masterpiece. She must have been some artist, because Bill couldn’t tell the difference. He tried to send her the famous work last year, but supposedly she said it was ‘unnecessary’ because she had already stolen ‘the damn thing’ - replacing it with the replica she painted.
Sue supposedly blames Bill’s ignorance for not recalling that she had painted her own version years ago. And, really he should have known because it’s been revealed that he used to boast his wife was ‘the artist of the family’ and that she ‘likes to paint replicas of some of the famous pieces, using an overhead projector to copy the outlines and then just sort of fill in the spaces.’ Reportedly, Sue remembers saying to Bill, ‘[w]hy spend $20 million? I can paint that one for $75.’
This wasn’t the only piece Sue nabbed, for she also took a 7-foot, 300-pound sculpture of a rabbit. We wonder if she carved a new version of that, too?
How do we know all of this? This masterpiece (the real one, we hope) is on sale as part of Sotheby’s forthcoming Impressionist and Modern sale where it will likely fetch $35 million (£25.9 million), which is a good deal more than Sue’s $75 (£55) replica.