Happy anniversary baby

Today is the 100th anniversary of the theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre - and the 50th anniversary of another heist I'd never heard of, the lifting of Goya's portrait of the Duke of Wellington from the National Gallery in London. The Guardian has a good story about the two snatches.

Stop thief! Art, theft, mystery.

Since the May theft of 5 works from the Musée d’Art Moderne, coverage of art thefts either seems to have picked, or just become highlighted in my browsing consciousness.

Last week's New York Times magazine ran this fabulous story about art-theft blogger Turbo Paul. Virginia Heffernan writes:

The minute I saw the Paris heist in the news, I knew Turbo Paul would be psyched: traffic to Art Hostage would spike, his brain would rev high and he would get to peddle innuendo and what he presents as underworld intelligence. When news of big heists break, “I am at my toxic best,” he told me. A self-described former dealer in stolen antiques, he says he now actively works “to recover the art.”

This lifted-eyebrow, if-you-know-what-I’m-saying voice makes his blogs irresistible, as does the fact that Turbo Paul knows everything about cops and robbers — or seems to.

Then the other day in the NYT books section, this review of Robert K. Wittman's memoir 'Priceless: How I Went Undercover to Rescue the World’s Stolen Treasures'. Wittman was the founder of the F.B.I's Art Crime Team, and let's face it, the idea of chasing art-stealing villains around the world and diving into the murky depths of the art black market just cries out for a movie treatment. Of course, that's already happened (twice).

Then last night I wandered past a Whitcoulls and saw piles of Noah Charney's 'The Art Thief' on the sale table. That brought to mind Iain Pears' Jonathan Argyll series, and Michael Frayn's 'Headlong'.


Finally, this story of the restoration of a Tintoretto in a stately home in England appeared on the Guardian's site. Scholars are having trouble identifying the subject matter of the painting (Apollo or Hymen marrying someone to someone else?) and the Guardian's interactive turns the work into an iconographical whodunnit. Shades of Dan Brown abound ('Cracking the Tintoretto code').

Trend? Co-incidence? Hyper-awareness? Or at least, some good reading material.

That's a first

Auckland's Starkwhite gallery have posted about a work stolen from a recent opening.

Theft is big

As Over the net has previously noted, theft is one of the classic memes in the main stream media art coverage.

Several art theft stories are chasing their tails around the newspapers at the moment, what with the FBI looking for the owners of a stash of pieces found in the home of a collector who turned out not to be what he purported (oh, come on, who hasn't pretended to be married to a member of the French aristocracy?) and a trial kicking off over a Cezanne stolen 30 years ago.

The true meme-y-ness of this topic was brought home to me by this:


... the section of the Guardian's website given over to art theft stories.

Yeah, not so funny after all

Since posting below about the Art Squad, a story has hit the news about the theft of works by C.F. Goldie and Colin McCahon from the Auckland University Library ....

Art theft story - NZ Herald

Now hiring...

The Art Newspaper has posted a story about the Metropolitan Police's effort to recruit members of the art world to its Art and Antiques Unit (in danger of being disbanded if it's not able to start paying its own way).

Art Beat Special Constables are being recruited from museums such as the Victoria & Albert and the British Museum, universities, insurance companies and other cultural organisations. After four weeks training in police procedure as well as specialist art squad techniques, volunteers will be sponsored by their employers to work as Special Constables for 200 hours a year or one day a fortnight. They will be uniformed and will have full police powers.

“The aim is to build bridges between the police and the art world and maintain a high visibility presence in areas with a high level of art sales,” said DS Rapley. “This could include patrolling antiques markets like Bermondsey or areas with clusters of art dealers like Kensington Church Street, Bond Street or Camden Passage, or undercover intelligence work.”

The Art Newspaper story

Interestingly, the Met police are London's largest employer

Recruitment - www.met.police.uk

The story has caused a bit of tongue-in-cheek commentary on various blogs, including Edward Winkleman's. However, given last year's spate of art thefts in new Zealand, maybe we could think about freeing some of our directors' time up so that they can give back to the art world?

Ray Haydon sculpture stolen from Parnell gallery - www.scoop.co.nz
Sarah Courtney sculpture stolen from Hawkes Bay gallery - Hawkes Bay today
Helme Hein sculpture stolen from property in Russell - TVNZ website

Image: A stolen silver carriage clock, from S.L.A.D - the Met's Stolen London Art Database