“Maurizio Cattelan is Italy’s most successful contemporary artist. In 2004 after his sculpture of a hanging horse, The Ballad of Trotsky, was auctioned for $1.2m (now £686,000), ArtReview magazine put him at number four on a list of the art world’s VIPs. It was the highest ranking for any artist. But the Genoa-born artist Vanessa Beecroft – best known for her disturbing installations of living, almost nude, models – said she had had an affair with Cattelan before either became famous and that she was the source for many of his ideas.”