Topline
The U.S. government sold artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat and Pablo Picasso as well as a Diane Arbus photograph Thursday as part of the government’s attempt to recoup more than $4.5 billion allegedly stolen from the 1MDB development fund by Jho Low, a Malaysian financier now missing after allegedly helping orchestrate one of the largest embezzlement schemes in history.
The two Basquiat paintings, “Self Portrait” and “Red Man One,” sold for $8,332,500 and $22,002,790, respectively, auction house Gaston & Sheehan said.
The Picasso, a 1939 painting titled “Tête de taureau et broc,” was sold for $5,007,502, while the Diane Arbus photograph "Exasperated Boy with a Toy Hand Grenade in Central Park, N.Y.C. 1962" sold for $500,150.
One of the Basquiat paintings, the Picasso and the Arbus photograph were all once owned by Leonardo DiCaprio, who turned over the artwork to the federal government in 2017.
1Malaysia Development Berhad, a now-defunct state-owned development fund set up by former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in 2009, was the center of a massive international corruption scandal first uncovered in 2015. Razak was found guilty on corruption charges related to funds siphoned from the company in 2020 and is currently serving a 12-year jail sentence. Jho Low was originally a consultant helping oversee the fund, but Low’s wild spending on real estate, expensive parties with celebrities, and yachts eventually attracted the attention of international journalists and investigators in Malaysia. Using funds allegedly stolen from the 1MDB fund, Low also backed Red Granite Pictures, a film production company that most notably produced Martin Scorsese’s “The Wolf of Wall Street”—a story about another financial fraudster, starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Low’s location is unknown, and he is still wanted by Interpol and faces federal charges in the Eastern District of New York. The Justice Department has recovered at least $1.7 billion in stolen funds so far, the government said in January.
Low originally purchased “Red Man One” from a gallery in New York for $9.1 million, according to a forfeiture complaint from 2017. The same complaint notes he purchased the Arbus photograph from an archive in New Jersey for $750,000 with “diverted 1MDB funds.” Low gave both items as gifts to DiCaprio in 2014. The Picasso painting, which was identified by prosecutors by the alternative name “Nature Morte au Crane de Taureau,” was also purchased with about $3.2 million from 1MDB funds, according to prosecutors. It was transferred to DiCaprio along with a birthday note in 2014, which reads: “Dear Leonardo DiCaprio, Happy belated Birthday! This gift is for you.” The note was signed with the initials of an associate of Low, prosecutors said. DiCaprio has not been implicated in any wrongdoing, and initiated the return of the artwork to the government, his representatives told Artnet News when both the painting and photograph were seized in 2017.