| Friedel Dzubas Painting Was
Actually By His Girlfriend Who Sues As SDNY
Judge Cites Hirst
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- The
Source
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
May 8 – How much is a painting
mis-attributed to Abstract
Expressionist Friedel Dzubas
but actually by his one-time
girlfriend Marianne Hicks
worth?
And how
does that related to the
Federal court's jurisdictional
threshold of $75,000?
These questions arose in a
civil proceeding on May 8
before U.S. District Court for
the Southern District of New
York Judge Edgardo Ramos,
covered exclusively by Inner
City Press.
Marianne Hicks painted it in
1981, and took it to residence
of then 11-year boyfriend
artist Fridel Dzubas,
ultimately leave it behind.
The
Complaint says this was when
"Dzubas developed Parkinson's
disease" and his "adult
children discouraged him from
continuing his relationship
with [Hicks] and encouraged
him to begin a romantic
relationship with a new
woman." In
the hearing on May 8, this
"new woman" was named, Melinda
(or as the court reporter was
told, Malinda) Hatch.
Years later Marianne Hicks was
browsing an art website and
saw her painting - being sold
as a Dzubas. She tried to
resolve it, ultimately sued
with a 50 page affidavit from
Dzubas' studio assistant
Wesley Frantz.
Leslie Feely Fine Art LLC's
defense is that the value of
the painting would only be of
a Hicks, none of which have
sold. They aruged for
dismissal for failure to reach
the jurisdictional
amount.
Judge
Ramos said that art is "sui
generis," that while he'd
never heard of Marianne Hicks,
he'd also never heard of
Dzubas. So how, he asked, can
he find as a matter of law
that a Hicks is not worth
$75,000?
He noted he
recently read of a Damien
Hirst work being cut up and
the pieces
sold.
Ultimately both sides have
been allowed some discovery,
on the pricing of any sales of
Hicks work, and apparently for
the sale prices of this
painting to John Doe.
A motion to
dismiss is due June 8, with
opposition July 2 and any
replied by July 22. The case
is Marianne Hicks v. Leslie
Feely Fine Art, LLC et
al., 20-cv-1991 (Ramos).
***
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