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# Billionaire Art Fight: Perelman v Gagosian
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/billionaire-art-fight-perelman-v-gagosian/
- Published: 2012-09-13T19:08:26.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:02:06.000Z
- Description: New York billionaire Ron Perelman is filing for "divorce" from his art mentor/dealer Larry Gagosian and the two A-listers are battling over three art works worth over $25 million.
- Author: Hrag Vartanian
- Tags: Opinion, Art Crime, Jeff Koons, Larry Gagosian, The 1%, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 06:51 (2012, 2013, part 1)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2012/09/popeye-gagosian-perelman-home.jpg "Popeye-gagosian-perelman-HOME")

New York billionaire Ron Perelman is filing for “divorce” from his art mentor/dealer Larry Gagosian and the two A-listers are battling over three art works worth over $25 million.

Not to be outdone, Gagosian is also filing against his mentee, and, [*The Daily News*](http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/billionaire-ronald-perelman-art-dealer-larry-gagosian-scrap-dueling-lawsuits-25-million-painting-sculptures-article-1.1158012?ref=hyperallergic.com) notes, the two lawsuits were filed only hours apart.

Perelman is crying over a supposed secret deal with Jeff Koons, whose granite Popeye sculpture is one of the works in question, that would impact the work’s resale value. On the other hand, Gagosian:

> … claims Perelman agreed to pay $12.6 million cash for an unidentified sculpture (not “Popeye”) and $10.5 million for an unidentified painting.  
>  
> Instead, the gallery said, Perelman paid $4.7 million cash on the sculpture and $250,000 toward the painting but insisted on giving the gallery other art in barter payment for the balance.

It is a little know (and unconfirmed) fact that when billionaires file lawsuits over Popeye sculptures, Jeff Koons gets sexually excited and eats spinach.