French sculptor Daniel Druet sues Maurizio Cattelan for $5.25 million over uncredited works

French sculptor Daniel Druet is taking legal action against Maurizio Cattelan, his gallerist Emmanuel Perrotin, and the Monnaie de Paris, seeking $5.25 million in damages. Druet claims he created nine wax sculptures for Cattelan's installations—including La Nona Ora (1999), which depicts Pope John Paul II struck by a meteorite, and Him (2001), showing Hitler as a kneeling child—but was never credited in exhibition catalogs or labels. Their collaboration began in the late 1990s when Cattelan visited the Musée Grévin in Paris and was impressed by Druet's wax figures. Druet was paid an average of €33,000 per statue, but says instructions were vague, often arriving via fax or through Italian assistants who barely spoke French. The case highlights longstanding debates about authorship in contemporary art, where conceptual artists often outsource fabrication. Druet had previously expressed his frustration through the work CouCou, which depicts Cattelan emerging from an egg with an innocent expression. The Paris Intellectual Property Court will hear the case on May 13.