Every now and again something astonishing happens, pure luck you might say, a brilliant convergence of chance to be in the right place at the right time, the subconscious dictating the conscious.
Cue Zach Bodish, a 46-year-old man from Ohio, who, in his usual weekly jaunt to a thrift store – otherwise known as a charity shop – chanced up a seemingly self-effacing print of an almost childlike etching of a face with the text “Exposition” written above, framed against a taupe background.
Although it also contained Pablo Picasso’s name under the title, Mr Bodish thought it nothing more than a reproduction, and duly handed over $14.14 (approximately £8.79) for it based purely on its charming aesthetic. It has since sold for $7,000 (approximately £4,532) in a private deal.
The print, a linocut, was discovered to be one of a hundred original prints that the Spanish painter had produced in 1958; posters to accompany an exhibition on some of his ceramic works.
Mr Bodish discovered this after deciding to investigate further its history and then chanced upon the artist’s faded signature – penned in red ink – when he decided to inspect the print with a magnifying glass. He also found that it was numbered 6/100 and also contained French phrasing which was translated into “original print, signed proof”. On meeting with a representative from a well-known auction house, he felt satisfied enough to sell the original print.
Though he was at first reluctant to part with a hidden Picasso gem – it is by no means a masterpiece in any given sense – Mr Bodish, who is unemployed and tries to make ends meet through buying, restoring and then reselling second-hand furniture, plans on spending the money paying bills and for essentials like food.
“It’s just been a rough struggle to make ends meet,” he told the Associated Press. “I may have been fated to find it.” Indeed, it may certainly have been his destiny. After all, Picasso once famously said: “I don’t seek, I find.”