Wynn Some, Lose Some

No one (as far as I know) has pointed up this irony about Steve Wynn's elbow-jab to his own Picasso:

Back in 2002, Wynn refused to lend "Le Rêve" to the landmark "Matisse Picasso" show that appeared at the Tate Modern, the Grand Palais and the Museum of Modern Art. He believed that the proposed insurance coverage for the painting was inadequate.

It turns out that it would have been safer at the museum show than it was in his own office.

In 2003, Carol Vogel of the NY Times interviewed Wynn about his decision not to lend:

''I was too afraid,'' Mr. Wynn said. ''There are still too many gaps in the insurance coverage. I can't replace this picture. There's not another painting like it.''

''It's not like it's in my living room; it's on public view,'' Mr. Wynn said, referring to his art gallery in the lobby of what was the Desert Inn. So precious is this painting to Mr. Wynn that he is naming his new casino Le Rêve.

Vogel also noted that no one else had withdrawn work selected for the show, despite the terrorism fears that were then making everyone nervous. "The Modern was so hopeful" that Wynn would relent, Vogel wrote, that it reproduced his painting on catalog's cover. Then it had to revisit the printer to re-do the cover, featuring a different Picasso. (CultureGrrl owns a copy of the first printing. Is this a collector's item?)

Wynn's wife Elaine chose to regard Marie-Thérèse Walter's wound as "a sign" that they should hold onto the painting, rather than sell it, as had been planned.

Maybe it was really a sign that they should have lent it.