Mexico’s National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature (INBAL) said Monday that it was investigating the alleged destruction of an original work by Mexican painter Frida Kahlo (1907-1954).
INBAL affirmed that it is collecting “all the necessary information to establish with certainty” what happened and also stressed that there is a decree that declares all the work of the Mexican artist as an artistic monument.
According to several publications, the work “Sinister Ghosts” (1944), valued at ten million dollars (about 10.4 million euros), was burned by businessman Martin Mobarak, who justified the action as a process to turn the work into 10,000 NFT, a single digital record embedded in a ‘blockchain’, the system used for cryptocurrencies.
The incineration of the work of art took place on July 30 in Miami, United States. Among the institutions that will benefit from this action are the Frida Kahlo House Museum, the Palace of Fine Arts and the National School of Plastic Arts, said the businessman.
INBAL denied that any of its institutions, such as the Palace of Fine Arts or the Palace Museum, will receive any donation from the collector, contrary to what the collector has publicly stated, according to a statement.
He also recalled that the Bank of Mexico is the trustee of the Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo House-Museum, “in its capacity as owner of the patrimonial rights of the works.”
On the other hand, he pointed out that, to date, “he has not received a request and has not issued authorization to reproduce the work in question” and stressed that, in Mexico, “the deliberate destruction of an artistic monument constitutes a crime typified by Federal Law Monuments and Archaeological, Artistic and Historical Zones”.
Source: TSF
