Posted on 04/13/2002 3:22:19 PM PDT by wistful
PM in fake painting row 14 April 2002
By OSKAR ALLEY
Prime Minister Helen Clark has admitted misleading an animal welfare group by submitting an artist's painting as her own work for a charity auction.
Clark was asked to do a painting to raise funds for Save Animals from Exploitation (SAFE). Instead her office commissioned an artist to paint it. Clark signed the painting, creating the impression the work was her own.
The painting sold at auction for $1000. Clark has admitted the deception to the Sunday Star-Times. She has agreed to write a personal cheque to reimburse the buyer and accepts the saga has damaged her credibility.
Clark is blaming time pressures for her actions, but says while she has "bent over backwards" for charity groups, she has decided she will no longer contribute art to any fundraising venture.
She said she believed the practice had been going on for years, with other ministers from previous governments guilty of the same sort of behaviour.
Clark is also the minister for arts, culture and heritage.
The man who bought the painting - Auckland businessman Henry van Dijk - said he was appalled at the deception. The painting had been framed and took pride of place on his living room wall.
"She should never have signed that painting if she didn't do it," van Dijk said. "I feel I've been misled. It's a rip-off and to me this is like a forgery case."
Auckland criminal lawyer Barry Hart said the matter was reprehensible. "To be perfectly honest it's got all the hallmarks of a conspiracy to defraud under the Crimes Act."
SAFE says it feels Clark misled the charity, because it always believed she had painted it herself.
Van Dijk has a diploma in art retailing. He is demanding Clark pay him back and wants the prime minister to paint him a picture to apologise.
Clark said she was not prepared to do a painting.
The prime minister was forced to confirm the matter after this newspaper learned of the incident and located the real artist.
The saga dates back to February 1999, when, as leader of the opposition, Clark agreed to submit a painting.
Lauren Fouhy - who describes herself as a "recreational" artist - confirmed she was asked by a member of Clark's office to paint the art work. She said she was chosen because she had a relative who worked in the office.
When confronted Fouhy said: "I don't want it to turn into anything that's going to cause embarrassment to anyone. Talking to you could backfire on me."
She said she knew it was for Clark to submit to a celebrity auction.
Fouhy did the painting for free. When asked if she was a Labour supporter, she said: "Why do you think there was blue in the picture? It wasn't particularly her (Clark) that I painted it for."
Van Dijk said the whole deception appalled him. "Everybody knows that when you put a signature to a painting it means you were the artist. There's no question about it.
"The painting is a joke. If it's not by her it's not worth $2 now."
Van Dijk said he did not know what to do with the painting, because any attempt to sell it would be perpetuating the "fraud" he fell victim to.
"I don't want it on the wall now, it sickens me to look at it."
He said he bought the painting because he expected Clark would become prime minister and it would appreciate in value. The painting was one of three items he bought at the celebrity auction, spending about $2500. The auction at Auckland's Sky City also featured work by celebrities Sam Neill, Rima Te Wiata and Clark's now cabinet colleague, Alliance MP Sandra Lee.
A Lee spokesman said she painted it herself.
Clark's office originally said she would not comment on the matter.
But she contacted the Star-Times wishing to point out that she had invested a lot of time in charity fundraisers.
"I've bent over backwards to be helpful to charities."
She said she would write van Dijk a $1000 cheque.
But she added that celebrity art auctions should not be taken too seriously. The buyer needed to see the forest for the trees and realise that it was all for a good cause. "Normally these are novelty events where no one takes it very seriously. Let's not get too precious here."
However, Clark said she would not be painting something herself to give to van Dijk as an apology.
The minister for arts and culture said: "Yeah, I'll write the cheque for him. Look I really don't ever want to hold a paint brush again. I'm not really interested in that.
"Sometimes I've done a doodle myself but I really don't want to because I have no great artistic gifts."
The prime minister accepted that the saga would dent her credibility, but said: "The only thing I can be accused of is trying to be helpful when I didn't have time.
"We thought it was a good cause and something was put in."
Clark said she had already decided to stop submitting art works for fundraisers, after a "very, very pushy" charity pestered her office last year. She declined to name the charity.
"I said 'look I'm not going to do it, I don't want anyone else doing it . . . I'm outta here'."
Clark said she would continue to autograph wine bottles and contribute her time for prizes of morning teas with her.
Yesterday she was in Dunedin walking a track with the winner of a charity auction. "And I could really do without going to Dunedin to climb a track. But there you are, that's what you do.
"I've got a lot on my plate running the country. . . but you'd be surprised how pushy people are."
Clark said she had allowed the painting to be done by someone else because of "time pressures".
"It was election year, I was the leader of the opposition and I was as busy as a one-armed wallpaper hanger."
She said she suspected the painting in her name was "awful". "If I'd done it myself it would have been equally awful if not more awful. But it's really a question of time, it's just not worth it."
Barry Hart said the purpose of the painting and having it signed was so that people would be more likely to pay a higher figure.
"I mean people get charged in criminal courts all the time for being involved in things like this. It's an agreement to commit an illegal act, to deceive the public.
"If the truth had been known and the auctioneer had said `look it says painted by Helen Clark but, hey, we all know what goes on', nobody would have bid 50c.
"The issue of intent could be said to be missing but there is a conspiracy to defraud here. A person of her standing should know better. The public should not be duped, it's reprehensible all the way through."
Art auctioneer Dunbar Sloane jnr said yesterday that Clark's behaviour had been "a bit misleading" and "naughty".
"She shouldn't have signed her name to it if she didn't do it, that's a bit wrong.
"It's not like she's an accomplished artist, like a Hotere, but I don't think the art world would be terribly impressed. At least it was for a charity."
SAFE director Anthony Terry said he could not believe Clark's action.
"Helen has been very naughty. I can appreciate that she was busy, but with hindsight it put us in a bad light. At least she's made amends."
At the time Clark presented the painting to SAFE for the auction, SAFE organiser Gary Reese said he loved her effort: "I think she has been very courageous and it has worked well."
National leader Bill English said: "The voting public should watch this behaviour very closely."
It was done for charity, she'll pay the money back, others have done the same thing, blah blah blah, all platitudes designed to disguise the immorality of the issue
Hmm. Sounds more like she never did contribute art. Not her own, anyway.
She said she believed the practice had been going on for years, with other ministers from previous governments guilty of the same sort of behaviour.
If I am to believe Helen Clark, New Zealand is one strange place. Their elected officials are all expected to be able to paint, and expected to donate their work to charity; naturally many of them fold under the pressure and commission ringers to produce canvases for them to sign...it's "been going on for years"...sounds like an alternate universe down there.
Her basic principle is to screw the military, NZ has an Airforce in name only thanks to HELL’n, and pump money into the arts. She even appears in commercials endorsing NZ arts!
If she’d admit to misleading the voting public more often she'd have her a$$ kicked out of office sooner rather than later.
"But it was just about art."
Has Al Gore stepped in yet to claim that he was the painter?
Uh huh. What segment of the population bends over backwards? Ye shall know them by their fruit and this fruit stinks. NZ's gov't should stand on principle instead of bending over backwards for every opportunity for another vote to keep globalists in power.
[Bumping NZ/AU interest list]
The alternate universe is in the minds of the oligarchic, globalist elite who run the place and try to keep the sheep in the dark and are actually quite good at it. Some people will do anything for money, others will do anything to stay in power: i.e. sell off the countries resources to foreign money (which goes in whose pocket?) and trade gov't sustainable forestry to the green machine environmentalists for votes. The pathway to Hell is paved with the good intentions of globalist compromisers.
In the old days if a teenager tried that one, a parent would have taken him to the woodshed for correction. Nowadays, people in office do that and not only get away with it, they get re-elected. They have their reward. If the decent people in NZ get their way, Clarke will not be re-elected.
New Zealand is already a socialist country.
Er...no, she wasn't any more welcome than any other ambassador. The fact she was the first black ambassador from the US to New Zealand may have made her appear a bit exotic in the eyes of some. There was some controversy in New Zealand about some background events in her life before taking up her post
The Auckland city central power crisis I think you refer too was just that. It encompassed about 4 blocks of the CBD and occured when the underground power cables feeding that area melted/blew/whatever, due, according to the later official report, to excessive underground temperatures at the time (summer). The in-progress underground tunnel to carry replacement cables was completed some months later. Above ground temporary cables supplied power to the CBD until the tunnel was completed.
At the least, Oldfriend, your posts have entertainment value.
I think that depends on the definition of "socialist". In the last 100 years, more right wing governments have been in power in New Zealand than left wing. A country is not socialist because it has a current left wing Government. Was America communist for eight years because its President was so? Is the UK a socialist country because it has a curent left wing Government? A socialist country would seem to be one where its Government is continually socialist, say, a-la Cuba. This is not the pattern in New Zealand, the UK, Australia or the US.
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