There’s rich — and then there’s the kind of rich when you don’t even know someone stole your Picasso!
Billionaire socialite Wilma “Billie” Tisch is suing a Florida gallery owner for trying to sell a $1 million Picasso that was stolen from her Manhattan home — sometime after December 2009, according to court papers.
Tisch, 88, only recently discovered the 1928 portrait of the famed painter’s mistress, Marie-Therese Walter, was missing.
“What took everyone so long to figure out it was missing?” Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Joan Kenney asked Tisch’s attorney at an emergency hearing Wednesday.
“They have a significant collection of art,” attorney Luke Nikas explained.
The Miami gallery owner, Kenneth Hendel, was also flabbergasted by the socialite’s loose grasp on her collection.
“When is too rich, too rich to not notice you’re missing a Picasso for 10 years?” Hendel said.
Forbes has pegged Tisch’s net worth at $1.41 billion.
She last saw the 14-inch-by-7½-inch canvas in 2009 when she had it appraised by Christie’s while it was on display at her Fifth Avenue apartment, her suit says.
The widow of real estate magnate Laurence Tisch realized the work, “Tete,” was gone earlier this month. A Manhattan art dealer had emailed her son Thomas Tisch to tell him he was involved in a transaction of a piece that once belonged to his father.
She also discovered it had been put up for auction by Sotheby’s in 2013 but never purchased. The auction catalog says that Laurence Tisch, who died in 2003, had sold the painting to a private collector. The catalog doesn’t list a transaction date.
Tisch has searched her personal files and “found no record reflecting any sale or gift of the work,” her Manhattan civil suit says.
Her attorney, Luke Nikas, believes Tisch’s ex-maid– who now lives in Ecuador– stole the painting sometime before 2013. He’s considering reporting the crime to the FBI.
The gallerist, Hendel, bought the canvas from a Miami LLC controlled by a man named Mahmoud Antar for $500,000 in June 2013, records show. Hendel’s lawyer, Robert Stok, said Antar purchased it from the maid for $60,000 in February 2013. Stok says Tisch gifted the artwork to the servant.
Hendel told The Post he checked a stolen property registry and combed through police reports before purchasing the piece.
“I’m an innocent bystander,” he said.
After the transaction with the Manhattan dealer fell through Hendel had the artwork shipped back to Florida from a New York warehouse Tuesday morning over the wealthy widow’s objections.
On Wednesday Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Joan Kenney ordered Hendel to return the Picasso to the Upper East Side warehouse where it should be stored until after a May 10 hearing on the dispute.