She didn’t make it big during her life, so she’s trying after death.
The estate of lonely old housewife Mary Lincoln Bonnell — who died with millions to her name trying to become a famous sculptor — is offering $10,000 to anyone who will take one of her 70 giant abstract sculptures and promise to display it regularly.
“She wants the name Mary Lincoln Bonnell out there,” her trustee, estate attorney Herbert Nass told The Post.
“It keeps her alive — it’s her bid for immortality.”
Bonnell died at 84 in April after a fire started in her Greenwich Village apartment. She was living alone with her cat.
Three years before her death, the childless widow crafted a will that would use her cash to promote her name and work after her death.
“The Trustee shall pay from the trust income and/or principal an amount up to TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS ($10,000) per work of Artistic Property given to a gallery, museum, school, and/or other cultural institution, on the condition that such institution agrees to display and exhibit such work of Artistic Property on a regular basis,” the will states, although she later amended the provision to exclude galleries.
Bonnell showcased her work in various galleries in Soho and the Hamptons, but never sold a piece. The arched sculptures are made of plaster and metal and are sitting in a warehouse in Long Island City.
Nass has placed Bonnell’s sculptures at NYU’s Law School, the Historic Hudson Valley Society, and Guild Hall in East Hampton, where her work was once displayed.
He still has 67 sculptures to go. If there is money left over from her estate after 10 years, her cousins in Nebraska will receive it.
“It was most important to her that her sculptures find a home after her death,” Nass said. “It’s a way people will remember her.”
Bonnell was married to Wall Street tycoon Joseph Clark, whose grandfather was Pennsylvania Sen. Joseph Clark. She was widowed in 2001.
She was a student of George Grosz, a famous German-born graphic artist.