A group calling itself "Australian Cultural Terrorists" claimed responsibility, making a number of demands (and insults) in letters to the then-Victorian Minister for the Arts, Race Mathews.

After an anonymous tip-off to police, the painting was found undamaged in a locker at Spencer Street railway station on 19 August 1986.

[2] While the painting at the Tate Modern is in bright reds, blues and yellows, the 18 October work has been described as "an unsettling combination of acid greens and vibrant mauves exaggerated by thick black outlines".

[7] On Saturday, 2 August 1986, thieves obtained access to the National Gallery of Victoria and unscrewed the painting from its wall mounting.

[9] (In 1911, Picasso and his contemporary Guillaume Apollinaire were both suspects in the Mona Lisa theft, but were cleared of any association with the crime.

[8] Initially it was suspected that the crime might have been perpetrated by a gang of international art smugglers, and the possibility of an "inside job" was not considered.

"[4][9] In his 2003 memoir, The Bright Shapes and the True Names, McCaughey wrote that, a few days before the painting was recovered, a Melbourne art dealer called him to say that a young artist may know something about the theft.

When he visited the artist's studio, McCaughey writes, he made a point to say that he was interested in the return of the painting, not a conviction for the crime: "I said deliberately, at least twice, that the people who had taken the work could deposit it in a luggage locker at Spencer Street railway station or at Tullamarine Airport.

"[11] Two days later, on 19 August 1986, following an anonymous phone call to police, the painting was found undamaged and carefully wrapped in brown paper tied with string in locker number 227 at Spencer Street station.

[16] An extract printed in The Age read: Of course we never looked to have our demands met ... Our intention was always to bring to public attention the plight of a group which lacks any of the legitimate means of blackmailing governments.

[21] In August 1986, while the painting was yet to be recovered, then-Australian Treasurer Paul Keating was caricatured in a political cartoon as the "Weeping Woman", his cause of sorrow being the 1986 Federal Budget.

A. Santamaria at around the same time, which urged that if the "Australian Cultural Terrorists" had in fact destroyed Picasso's work, they be awarded the Order of Australia.

'Comedy is always difficult,' wrote reviewer John Mangan, 'even when the most unlikely aspect of the plot - the remarkable ease with which a group of young artists can sneak paintings worth millions of dollars out of art galleries - is based in fact.

'[31] The Australian Film Commission funded a documentary by Melbourne independent filmmakers Colin Cairnes and Catherine Dyson about the theft entitled The Picasso Ransom.

[32] A search was made for Spencer Street station's locker 227, where the painting was found, which supposedly was taken with others to a regional rail facility, but it had been replaced and could not be located.

[8] Cairo, a 2013 novel by Australian writer Chris Womersley about life in inner-city Melbourne[34] uses the theft as a theme to describe its narrator's introduction into the bohemian lives of its other characters.

[37] The end of a disappointing 2012 AFL season for Australian football team Essendon Football Club was illustrated by a description of there being two well-known weeping figures within walking distance of each other in Melbourne: Essendon coach James Hird at the Melbourne Cricket Ground as well as "the famous one at the National Gallery of Victoria".