Thanks to The Huffington Post for drawing our attention to this story about a cruise ship passenger who recently tried to steal a painting from the vessel, apparently saying his plan was to mail it to himself. Read More
The $10 million worth of artwork stolen from the Southern California home of bond trader Jeffrey Gundlach in mid September has been returned, the Los Angeles Times reports. Nearly all of the collection—including works by Piet Mondrian, Jasper Johns and Richard Diebenkorn—was found Wednesday when police raided an automobile stereo shop, found there all but one of the missing artworks and arrested the 45-year-old shop manager. Read More
Famed bond investor Jeffrey Gundlach lost some $10 million last week when thieves broke into his Santa Monica home and stole select pieces from his art, watch and wine collections, along with his 2010 Porsche Carrera 4S. As news of the burglary broke, Mr. Gundlach offered a $200,000 reward for any information leading to the return of his stolen property. Now, according to the Financial Times, he’s increased the bounty for his art to $1.7 million in total. Read More
Police in Lower Merion, Penn. are on the lookout for a Philadelphia woman accused of stealing a bust of Benjamin Franklin from 1778, a version of which, acquired by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, was valued at $3 million, according to The Delaware County Daily Times. Read More
A very early Francis Picabia painting that was purloined from France’s Musée de Nevers in 1974 has been returned, after being identified at Christie’s London. According to the AFP, the work had been sold at auction, at both Sotheby’s and Christie’s, in three previous instances. (Thanks to Blouin Artinfo for pointing to the Le Figaro article on the subject.) Read More
Burglars in Fresno, Calif., who recently broke into the Clovis Gift & Jewelry Shoppe there discovered a treasure trove of paintings by the recently deceased artist Thomas Kinkade. The thieves made off with 40 works, valued together at $300,000. Read More
David J. Crespo, a Connecticut art dealer, was indicted on 12 counts of fraud for about $225,000 in fraudulent sales of Picassos and Chagalls. Read More
Tomorrow’s edition of The New York Times features a profile of master forger Ken Perenyi whose book Caveat Emptor: the Secret Life of an American Art Forger will hit shelves next month. Read More
NBC News is reporting that a small Salvador Dalí work titled Cartel des Don Juan Tenorio, with an estimated value of $150,000, was stolen on Tuesday from Venus Over Manhattan, the Upper East Side gallery recently started at 980 Madison by Adam Lindemann, an art collector and writer who pens a column for The Observer. A gallery rep reached by Gallerist declined to comment.
This is the latest of a number of thefts to hit New York galleries recently. Last year, a $30,000 Steven Parrino drawing was taken from the Marc Jancou gallery in Chelsea, and in March a thief made off with a number of Ellen Harvey paintings from Rivington Street’s Dodge Gallery, but was stopped when proprietor Kristen Dodge chased the person down and retrieved the works.
VOM’s current show, ”À Rebours,” is dimly lit, channeling the decadent interior of the Duc des Esseintes, who stars in J. K. Huysman’s book of the same name, presumably making a Dodge-style apprehension quite a bit more difficult. Read More
