Latest news with #MuseumofOldandNewArt
The Age
2 days ago
- Business
- The Age
MONA founder's secretive betting business in court over ‘rip off' by employees
These were the people Sean O'Toole stood accused of ripping off. Hired as a data analyst in 2017, O'Toole was meant to be working within the confines of American basketball and baseball. But the anonymous email suggested he had secretly installed a computer code to extract other information from the company's systems, which he then used to place his own bets. The tip-off triggered the Supreme Court action to uncover the scope of what Data Processors calls 'a dishonest and fraudulent design' to use company data for personal profit. Around the time of the search of O'Toole's apartment, he was sued for breaching duties of confidence arising from his employment. The list of defendants later expanded. Data Processors also sued former employee Joel Caley for allegedly writing an application known as the Jupyter Code, which was then installed by O'Toole. 'The data accessed and transmitted by the Jupyter Code … are in the nature of betting probabilities generated by the plaintiff's algorithms, including betting probabilities relating to horse racing,' Data Processors contended. In their court filings, Caley and O'Toole said they wrote the code together. A third employee, Michael Demos, was accused of accessing other betting odds data. The trio was said to have shared confidential information among themselves and with two non-employees, Kusuv Bhandari and Richard Zhang. According to Data Processors, each member of the group used confidential information to place bets funded with their own money, as part of a rival syndicate. Four of the defendants have admitted to some liability. Demos does not admit to what Supreme Court judge James Stevenson has called 'the critical allegations' but nor does he deny them. Loading What the group resists is the suggestion that Data Processors suffered losses and is entitled to compensation or damages – setting the stage for the ongoing court fight. The most well known of the company's directors is Walsh, who signs off on the financial records while also presiding over the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart. The former mathematics student wrote in his autobiography that he founded MONA in 2011 'to absolve myself from feeling guilty about making money without making a mark'. Ranogajec, who has served as a Data Processors director for the past 12 years, met Walsh in the 1980s, playing table tennis. The pair started card counting at the blackjack tables of Wrest Point casino in Hobart before later expanding into Keno and horse racing. It was a 2008 court case that first provided an insight into the scale of their operation. When Ranogajec moved to bankrupt a former business partner, federal magistrate Rolf Diver asked him how much the gambling syndicate turned over each year. 'My guess would be $1 billion,' Ranogajec replied. Telling the magistrate his syndicate was known as the Bankroll Punters Club, he said 'customers that bet on our level number in the handful in the world'. The Punters Club made headlines in 2012 when the ATO pursued syndicate members for about $600 million in taxes and penalties, arguing the club was a business rather than a hobby. The matter later settled out of court. Ranogajec moved to London, buying a property in the world's most expensive apartment block, One Hyde Park, and now goes by the name John Wilson (after his wife, Shelley Wilson). Walsh said in 2022 that Ranogajec remained the leader of the syndicate. In March, the NSW Supreme Court deferred a decision on whether to split the Data Processors trial into two hearings – one focused on guilt, the other on the extent of the financial damage to the company – until more evidence was served.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 days ago
- Business
- Sydney Morning Herald
MONA founder's secretive betting business in court over ‘rip off' by employees
These were the people Sean O'Toole stood accused of ripping off. Hired as a data analyst in 2017, O'Toole was meant to be working within the confines of American basketball and baseball. But the anonymous email suggested he had secretly installed a computer code to extract other information from the company's systems, which he then used to place his own bets. The tip-off triggered the Supreme Court action to uncover the scope of what Data Processors calls 'a dishonest and fraudulent design' to use company data for personal profit. Around the time of the search of O'Toole's apartment, he was sued for breaching duties of confidence arising from his employment. The list of defendants later expanded. Data Processors also sued former employee Joel Caley for allegedly writing an application known as the Jupyter Code, which was then installed by O'Toole. 'The data accessed and transmitted by the Jupyter Code … are in the nature of betting probabilities generated by the plaintiff's algorithms, including betting probabilities relating to horse racing,' Data Processors contended. In their court filings, Caley and O'Toole said they wrote the code together. A third employee, Michael Demos, was accused of accessing other betting odds data. The trio was said to have shared confidential information among themselves and with two non-employees, Kusuv Bhandari and Richard Zhang. According to Data Processors, each member of the group used confidential information to place bets funded with their own money, as part of a rival syndicate. Four of the defendants have admitted to some liability. Demos does not admit to what Supreme Court judge James Stevenson has called 'the critical allegations' but nor does he deny them. Loading What the group resists is the suggestion that Data Processors suffered losses and is entitled to compensation or damages – setting the stage for the ongoing court fight. The most well known of the company's directors is Walsh, who signs off on the financial records while also presiding over the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart. The former mathematics student wrote in his autobiography that he founded MONA in 2011 'to absolve myself from feeling guilty about making money without making a mark'. Ranogajec, who has served as a Data Processors director for the past 12 years, met Walsh in the 1980s, playing table tennis. The pair started card counting at the blackjack tables of Wrest Point casino in Hobart before later expanding into Keno and horse racing. It was a 2008 court case that first provided an insight into the scale of their operation. When Ranogajec moved to bankrupt a former business partner, federal magistrate Rolf Diver asked him how much the gambling syndicate turned over each year. 'My guess would be $1 billion,' Ranogajec replied. Telling the magistrate his syndicate was known as the Bankroll Punters Club, he said 'customers that bet on our level number in the handful in the world'. The Punters Club made headlines in 2012 when the ATO pursued syndicate members for about $600 million in taxes and penalties, arguing the club was a business rather than a hobby. The matter later settled out of court. Ranogajec moved to London, buying a property in the world's most expensive apartment block, One Hyde Park, and now goes by the name John Wilson (after his wife, Shelley Wilson). Walsh said in 2022 that Ranogajec remained the leader of the syndicate. In March, the NSW Supreme Court deferred a decision on whether to split the Data Processors trial into two hearings – one focused on guilt, the other on the extent of the financial damage to the company – until more evidence was served.
The Age
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
‘Tasmanian royalty' rules the Jordan Gogos runway
Rather than pander to celebrities, or have to pay them, designers at Australian Fashion Week in Sydney are enlisting high-profile friends to promote their shows. Celebrity cookbook writer Nigella Lawson looked on at Lee Mathews, while television personality Melissa Leong walked in Gary Bigeni's show. Radio host Carrie Bickmore sat front row at Aje and former Victoria's Secret model Jessica Hart walked the runway for Bianca Spender. The enfant terrible of fashion week Jordan Gogos aimed higher, summoning the couple often referred to as the closest thing to royalty in Tasmania, excluding Queen Mary of Denmark. David Walsh the founder and owner of the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart, dressed in Gogos's label Iordanes Spyridon Gogos to watch his wife Kirsha Kaechele model on the runway from the front row. 'It just made total sense for me because Kirsha is so theatrical, and she's got so many ideas,' says Gogos, a fan of Kaechele's creative defence of the male-free status of the controversial Ladies Lounge at Mona. At the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal last March, Kaechele was inspired by Robert Palmer's 1980s music video Simply Irresistible to perform silent choreography alongside a group of performers in navy suits, red lipstick and pearls. For Gogos, Kaechele shimmied down the Carriageworks runway in a multicoloured coat dress with neon-trimmed knee-high spats, stopping in front of Walsh for more elaborate dance moves. 'I feel that everything she throws herself into from the deep end is authentic,' Gogos says. 'Also they've been collecting a bit of my stuff.' Gogos manipulates fibres into one-off creations for the Sotheby's crowd rather than the Shein set. Even his runway shows are art, with stiff patchwork pieces and rough quilting, giving the impression of a Muppet Show reboot with classical motifs ran by an alternative art collective. 'I was on the treadmill earlier wondering how I got into this vortex and feeling the excitement of being a part of this,' says Gogos, who made his fashion week debut in 2020. 'I remember seeing the fashion week schedule in 2019, the year before my first show, and thinking that there was a space for this. There was a space for what I do.'
Sydney Morning Herald
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
‘Tasmanian royalty' rules the Jordan Gogos runway
Rather than pander to celebrities, or have to pay them, designers at Australian Fashion Week in Sydney are enlisting high-profile friends to promote their shows. Celebrity cookbook writer Nigella Lawson looked on at Lee Mathews, while television personality Melissa Leong walked in Gary Bigeni's show. Radio host Carrie Bickmore sat front row at Aje and former Victoria's Secret model Jessica Hart walked the runway for Bianca Spender. The enfant terrible of fashion week Jordan Gogos aimed higher, summoning the couple often referred to as the closest thing to royalty in Tasmania, excluding Queen Mary of Denmark. David Walsh the founder and owner of the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart, dressed in Gogos's label Iordanes Spyridon Gogos to watch his wife Kirsha Kaechele model on the runway from the front row. 'It just made total sense for me because Kirsha is so theatrical, and she's got so many ideas,' says Gogos, a fan of Kaechele's creative defence of the male-free status of the controversial Ladies Lounge at Mona. At the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal last March, Kaechele was inspired by Robert Palmer's 1980s music video Simply Irresistible to perform silent choreography alongside a group of performers in navy suits, red lipstick and pearls. For Gogos, Kaechele shimmied down the Carriageworks runway in a multicoloured coat dress with neon-trimmed knee-high spats, stopping in front of Walsh for more elaborate dance moves. 'I feel that everything she throws herself into from the deep end is authentic,' Gogos says. 'Also they've been collecting a bit of my stuff.' Gogos manipulates fibres into one-off creations for the Sotheby's crowd rather than the Shein set. Even his runway shows are art, with stiff patchwork pieces and rough quilting, giving the impression of a Muppet Show reboot with classical motifs ran by an alternative art collective. 'I was on the treadmill earlier wondering how I got into this vortex and feeling the excitement of being a part of this,' says Gogos, who made his fashion week debut in 2020. 'I remember seeing the fashion week schedule in 2019, the year before my first show, and thinking that there was a space for this. There was a space for what I do.'
The Guardian
03-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Tasmania's Dark Mofo is back with a bang – and a car crash: festival announces 2025 programme
A two-hour performance work involving an artist and a stunt driver culminating in a head-on car crash, a man being crushed by sand in a giant hourglass, and an open invitation to scream, are among some of the artworks heading to Tasmania's Dark Mofo festival, which is back this winter after taking a fallow year. The annual art festival, created by David Walsh's Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) and well known for its often controversial, confronting and humorous spirit, was called off last year so organisers could take stock of 'changing conditions and rising costs' to ensure its future. Many festivals around Australia have been cancelled in the last two years, including Dark Mofo's summer equivalent, Mona Foma, which finished in 2024 after 16 years. Estimates put Dark Mofo's economic impact on Tasmania at $54.3m in 2023, which reportedly fell to $7.1m in 2024, the fallow year. Now the festival has signed a new funding deal with the Tasmanian state government that will see Dark Mofo receive $7m a year for three years, allowing Walsh to step back and focus on other investments in the state. Works coming to Dark Mofo include a new work of 'staggering scale' by Trawlwoolway artist and playwright Nathan Maynard: We threw them down the rocks where they had thrown the sheep, named for a quote by a white settler describing a massacre of 30 First Nations people in 1828 over the killing of three sheep. The work, which will involve sheep flesh, will highlight how the remains of First Nations people are held in galleries and museums around the world. Online, some people have reacted poorly to the way the festival has teased the work, which will explore cultural theft and erasure – perhaps because of Dark Mofo's previous controversies, such as in 2021 when a Spanish artist asked Indigenous Australians to donate blood for a work that was swiftly cancelled. Chris Twite, the festival's new artistic director, said: 'I think people have a lot of preconceptions about the work that arts organisations do. Nathan is one of our greatest storytellers and he's written a story in flesh this time. This is an ongoing and horrible state of affairs and something that Nathan has been working in various ways for many years. 'I can't speak to curatorial decisions before my time, but what I can say is that we wanted to work with artists who are asking really big questions and addressing these complex situations in their work. The First Nations artists on our program are making incredible work and pushing the boundaries to hopefully propel us towards new resolutions and new concepts.' Crash Body will see Brazilian artist Paula Garcia and a stunt driver drive specially equipped cars in Hobart's Regatta Grounds for two hours of tension, in a tightly choreographed show of near misses that will culminate in a head-on collision. Twite said: 'It is a very physically demanding work on Paula, she began training several months ago to get into the physical state to ensure the tension, stress and the eventual crash.' Nicholas Galanin, an artist of the Sitka tribe of Alaska, will invite visitors to his participatory work, Neon Anthem, to 'take a knee and scream until you can't breathe'. Twite said the work, which has been popular in galleries around the world, would provide 'a moment of catharsis and protest'. 'When we spoke to Nicholas about the work, he had concerns about what we would think about how many times people scream and how long they scream for,' he said. 'We weren't going to place any limitations upon people or him.' Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning Carlos Martiel, an American-Cuban artist known for putting his body through grueling, painful performances to address violence against people of colour, will present a new work titled Custody, which see him imprisoned inside an hourglass as a tonne and a half of sand falls on his naked and restrained body. It will only be performed once as 'it is so demanding on his body', Twite said, describing it as 'a work that investigates the over-representation of people of colour inside the prison systems around the world'. Martiel's previous work, Cuerpo, which saw him hang himself from a gallery ceiling with a noose around his neck while passersby 'held his body aloft on the edge of life', will also be screened. 'It is a very confronting and challenging statement,' Twite said. Sign up to Saved for Later Catch up on the fun stuff with Guardian Australia's culture and lifestyle rundown of pop culture, trends and tips after newsletter promotion Everything is Recorded, a project by British record producer Richard Russell, will create an improvised sound work about the winter solstice that will be audible within seven kilometres of the city. Twite said the festival had been working closely with the City of Hobart and the environmental protection authority on the work, 'so that we can spread the reach of the art across the whole of the city. It should be beautiful.' And Quasi, the divisive statue by New Zealand artist Ronnie van Hout that haunted Christchurch and Wellington until it was mysteriously lifted out for a new home in October, will be placed atop a waterfront building in Hobart. Portishead's Beth Gibbons will perform, as will rock bands The Horrors and Diiv, US rapper Tierra Whack, US singer Jessica Pratt, Mancunian saxophonist and poet Alabaster DePlume and Australian post-punk group Crime and the City Solution. Metal groups Baroness, Spectral Wound, Imperial Triumphant and Clown Core will also appear. Many Dark Mofo regulars will return, including the Night Mass dance parties, the Winter Feast food market and the nude solstice swim, held on the shortest day of the year in the freezing waters of Sandy Bay. The swim was still held last year and saw its capacity increased from 2,000 to 3,000, but still sold out; Twite said it would remain open to 3,000 this year. Every year, a giant wooden effigy of a different endangered species is burned. This year's 'Ogoh-Ogoh' will be a Maugean skate, a flat-bodied ancient ray found only in Macquarie Harbour. The species has made headlines in the run up to the Australian federal election, as Tasmania's salmon farming industry threatens its extinction. Dark Mofo will be staged 5-15 June, then 21 June. Tickets go on sale to subscribers at 10am on Wednesday 9 April, then to the general public at 12pm.
