Man wins €1m Picasso painting in €100 charity raffle

An engineer and art enthusiast has won an original Pablo Picasso painting valued at more than €1m (£870,000; $1.2m) after purchasing a €100 ticket for a charity raffle benefiting Alzheimer's research. Ari Hodara, 58, learned he was the lucky recipient of the 1941 masterpiece during a surprise video call from Christie's auction house in Paris on Tuesday. Reacting to the life-changing news, Hodara was understandably skeptical, asking, "How do I know this isn't a prank?" This year's grand prize was "Tête de Femme" (Head of a Woman), a gouache-on-paper portrait rendered in Picasso's signature style that depicts his partner and muse, the French surrealist artist Dora Maar. Reflecting on his unexpected victory with ticket number 94,715, Hodara maintained his composure. "I was surprised, that's it," said Hodara during a phone call with auctioneers after the draw. "When you bet on this, you don't expect to win... But I'm very happy because I'm very interested in painting, and it's great news for me." He noted that he had purchased the ticket over the weekend after learning about the competition by chance. The drawing marks the third edition of the "1 Picasso for 100 euros" fundraising raffle, a concept founded in 2013 by French journalist Peri Cochin with the backing of Picasso's family and foundation. Organizers reported that more than 120,000 tickets were sold globally, generating approximately €11m (£10m; $13m). Of the total funds raised, €1m is set to go to the Opera Gallery, the painting's owner, while the remaining millions are being donated to France's Alzheimer's Research Foundation. Cochin pointed out the poetic convenience of the winner's location. "It's going to be very easy for us to deliver the painting, so we're happy," she said, noting that while tickets were sold in dozens of countries worldwide, the winner happened to live in Paris—the city where Picasso lived and worked for much of his life, and where thousands of his works are on display in museums. The head of the Alzheimer's foundation celebrated the significant financial impact of the event. "This Picasso initiative is one more building block so that one day Alzheimer's will be nothing more than a bad memory," the foundation's head Olivier de Ladoucette said, the AFP news agency reported. Previous iterations of the raffle have also seen international winners and supported varied global causes. The inaugural draw in 2013 was won by a 25-year-old American from Pennsylvania, raising funds to preserve the Unesco World Heritage Site of Tyre in Lebanon. In 2020, a 58-year-old Italian accountant claimed the second edition after her son bought her a ticket for Christmas, with proceeds supporting sanitation projects in schools and villages in Cameroon, Madagascar, and Morocco.