Almost everyone in the art profession, gallerists, artists, curators, museographers and more, has a story of how a work ended up terribly damaged or destroyed: a ceramic sculpture that was not hung correctly, a house painter who splashed a painting, an illustration that suffered a spilled drink, a wax work that was transported in a trunk in the summer heat... There are plenty of stories, but how often does it happen in galleries, museums or art fairs, where the works are incredibly expensive? Below, we share some costly mistakes that caught the attention of the media:

1. The false invitation to paint

On March 28, a young couple from Seoul who was visiting an exhibition on urban art came across a huge abstract work by JonOne, 7 meters wide by 4 meters high, in front of which there was a series of brushes and cans of paint. The couple assumed the brushes and cans were an invitation for attendees to participate in the work, and they made a couple of strokes about it.

It was not until closing that the museum staff discovered that the work had been tampered with, and studying the security videos, they realized that the couple had gone unnoticed for so long that they even took photographs while they were painting the work, convinced that they weren't doing anything wrong. The reality is that the painting supplies had only been placed in front of the work to present viewers with the tools with which the artist had worked with. The painting, valued at $400,000, is still on display, and it has not yet been determined whether it will be restored or not.

2. $200,000 for a selfie

In 2017, a gallery in Los Angeles went viral after a video of a woman destroying several works of art while trying to take a selfie. The temporary exhibition at The 14th Factory gallery consisted of a collection of stylized crowns, each placed on its own pedestal, and with a separation between pedestals of less than 1 meter. A visitor wanted to take a photo pretending that one of the crowns was on her head, so she crouched down next to one of the pedestals, but she lost her balance, hitting the pedestal behind her and releasing a domino-effect that ended up knocking over all the crowns in the same row, and completely destroying 3 of them.

The damages were estimated at $200,000, but no legal action was taken against the woman, as it was a student and an accident.

3. Avelina Lésper vs. OMR Gallery

This article could not be complete without the case of Avelina Lésper, a famous Mexican critic who was the protagonist of the destruction of a sculpture in Zona Maco (2020), the most important contemporary art fair in Mexico. Lésper was trying to place an empty soda can on top of a work to, in her words, capture a photograph with which she could prove an argument against the work. The work that she sought to criticize was a sculpture by Gabriel Rico, exhibited by the OMR Gallery, which consisted of a metal structure that supported a thin and large glass plate that was crossed by different objects such as balls, a pen, a knife, a branch and a rock, and its asking price was $20,000. Lésper had not yet captured the photograph of it when the sculpture's glass exploded, leaving it completely destroyed.

The event, in addition to unleashing theories about whether it was intentional or accidental, was a breeding ground for debates about whether it was a performance or not, or if the very action of destroying contemporary art meant something. The OMR Gallery acknowledged that it was an accident, but also stressed that Lésper could have been more prudent in respecting the distance from the sculpture. Lésper, for her part, suggested leaving the work destroyed as a way to “present its evolution” and offered to repair it (but not to pay the costs of the work), proposals that the gallery rejected. Eventually, the OMR Gallery decided not to take action against the writer.

4. The unfortunate stumble

In 2015, an exhibition called “Leonardo's face, images of a genius” was held in Taiwan, bringing together 55 works by different artists from different periods, and guided tours were offered. In one of these groups, a 12-year-old boy who was on a school trip tripped near a painting, and while holding a drink in one of his hands, it stuck like a fist on the canvas, creating a circular tear. The affected work, a still life by the baroque artist Paolo Porpora, was more than 350 years old, and the event was recorded and went viral thanks to a security camera that captured the moment.

Fortunately for the boy, the work was insured and was restored.

5. The $40 million dollar nudge

Steven Wynn, a magnate owner of the Wynn Resorts hotel and casino chain, decided in 2006 to sell one of his most valuable works, “La Revé” (1932) by Picasso. Wynn had acquired it for $48 million in 1997, and had agreed to sell it for $139 million. The negotiation had already concluded and was close to being carried out, so Wynn decided to hold a “farewell party” for the work with his friends.

Wynn, who has problems with his peripheral vision, was showing the work to his guests, without realizing that he was too close to it, when he accidentally elbowed the work, which punctured it. The sale of the work was canceled, and the media dubbed the story “the $40 million dollar nudge”; Some sources indicate that the name refers to the price that Wynn paid in 1997 for the work, and others, that this was the estimate of the damages.

Wynn's insurance covered the repair costs, and in 2013, “la Revé” went up for auction at Christie's for $155 million. You could say that the misfortune of 2006 ended up working in his favor.