Paedophile Rolf is just like Picasso, says his daughter
ROLF Harris’s daughter has compared her paedophile father to Picasso in a bizarre defence of his crimes.
In a tell-all book, Bindi Nicholls claims he is no different to the Spanish painter who took teenage lovers.
Entertainer and artist Harris was found guilty in 2014 of 12 indecent assaults on four girls, one aged only seven or eight, and jailed for nearly six years.
In January, he faces trial on eight new charges of indecent assault and sexual touching of girls and women aged between 12 and 27.
The disgraced 86- year- old’s daughter stood loyally by his side when he was found guilty and has defended him passionately ever since.
In leaked excerpts from her book, reportedly called BinVincible, she claims her father is no different to famous artists who have had relationships with young women. She maintains that Spanish master Picasso, often described as the greatest modern artist, had a lover aged 14 or 15 that he later wed.
Mrs Nicholls, 52, writes: ‘I watched a programme about Picasso’s wives and how he fell in love with this girl who became his muse and secret lover at the age of about 14-15. They waited until she was 16 and then got married and were married for years.
‘Do we now take all of his paintings from the galleries and burn them and denounce him as an artist and forget he ever painted? Because Picasso was a paedophile.’ It is not clear who Mrs Nicholls is referring to, but it is widely known Picasso had a 17-year- old lover with whom he had a daughter.
In the book, Harris’s only child goes to elaborate lengths to justify her father’s behaviour, at one point comparing his crimes to watching scantily- clad women in pop videos, according to The Sun. She writes: ‘ After all, how many people have looked at Britney Spears in the video of her in schoolgirl outfits?’
Mrs Nicholls also reportedly says she plans to expose Harris’s trial as a sham and calls his victims ‘liars, cheaters and thieves’.
Writing about one – a childhood friend of hers from the age of three – she says: ‘She loved drinking, she was a great drinker, which she inherited from her drinking family.
‘Yes my father should have been stronger, should have had better boundaries. He should have said no. He was married and he was the older and wiser of the two, this was my best friend so that was also a no go area, but he didn’t say no.
‘They both loved the danger and the secrecy, and don’t forget this flirtation went on for 20-odd years, but they only had actual sex twice.’
Mrs Nicholls, a fine artist and sculptor who lives in London, is said to be close to completing the book which she hopes will change the public perception of her father.