Pablo Picasso: Print Found in a Thrift Store

If you ever attended an elementary school art class, chances are that you’ve heard of Pablo Picasso. If not, you should know that Picasso was a very well known painter, sculptor, and printmaker from Spain. Being so famous, it should be impossible for anything associated with Picasso to be found at an average thrift store, right? For avid thrifter Zach Bodish, this was very wrong.

In 2012 while searching through his regular thrift store, Bodish came across a framed poster which advertised a 1958 Picasso exhibition. While in the store, Bodish noticed some key details. In the bottom left corner “6/100” was written which suggests the limited collection of such a poster. After turning the poster over, Bodish recognized the word “originale” amidst lines written in French. While not speaking French personally, these clues looked very promising to Bodish. He spent a mere $14.14 for this framed poster and left the shop to do some research on his newest treasure.

Following his first exhibition in 1901, Pablo Picasso held several more to showcase over 50,000 original paintings and other art pieces. As Zach Bodish soon came to learn, the artist held a ceramics exhibition in 1958. After some more research, Bodish came to the shocking realization that this thrift store find was in fact an original poster for the exhibition for which only 100 posters were produced. Not only that, but he translated the French writing on the back to
say “original print, signed proof” complete with Picasso’s signature. Not only was this poster a limited edition, it was also an artist’s proof. After (appropriately) freaking out over his one in a million find, Bodish sold the print for a surprising $7,000 which was a drastic increase from its predicted value of $4,000.

If you are wondering how anyone could possibly donate this treasure, Ed Zettler, an English teacher from Columbus, came forward and admitted to believing that it was simply a reprint. Luckily there were no hard feelings in this eventful tale. Zettler simply said, “That’s the risk you take when you bring something to the thrift store.