Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid • Hacker News Board

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#211

Post by asdff » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 4:16 AM UTC

frandroid wrote: post #86

black_puppydog wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

happens all the time that you ask for a replica and the dealer secretly plants a multi million dollar artwork in your bedroom. Seems legit. :D

And you've just decided that the "replica" was so good that you paid stolen-art-on-the-black-market money for it, not "good replica painter" money for it...

The thing is your books say "good replica money" and only your crypto wallet or offshore account or shell company slush fund or pile of gold have the 'stolen-art-on-the-black-market' money removed from the balance sheet. Smart accountants are payed a lot of money to figure out exactly how to hide this from overworked and underpaid auditors.

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#212

Post by brownbat » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 4:26 AM UTC

FPGAhacker wrote: post #207

grawprog wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or the painting gets sold to someone shady overseas for a private collection and it's never seen again. It's not like in movies, there's no romance or drama to it. Stolen art doesn't benefit the common good.

Stolen art opens up the market for forgeries.

Dick's version of the Man in the High Castle has a good meditation on forgeries.

Mostly when people buy art, they're buying provenance, proof that a celebrity artist in history touched this particular object.

Forgers have gotten incredibly sophisticated, finding ways to duplicate the texture of historical paints and style of brush strokes of masters.

I think we'd do a lot of good for the world by commissioning as indistinguishable fakes as possible for all famous works, putting them in a room where the originals are all shuffled in, then sending them out into the world so any museum or private collector can have one, with some chance it's actually the real thing, but mostly the value would collapse to however sublime it is to actually look at the work.

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#213

Post by friendlybus » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 4:51 AM UTC

brownbat wrote: post #212

FPGAhacker wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stolen art opens up the market for forgeries.

Dick's version of the Man in the High Castle has a good meditation on forgeries. Mostly when people buy art, they're buying provenance, proof that a celebrity artist in history touched this particular object. Forgers have gotten incredibly sophisticated, finding ways to duplicate the texture of historical paints and style of brush strokes of masters. I think we'd do a lot of good for the world by commissioning as ind…

The value of art is not just the ‘celebrity’ of an artist like he were an actor pimping out a cash-in film. Making a cultural contribution to the arts is a part of carrying your civilisation forward. The artist is valuable because they were the nexus point for many values and inspirations that speak highly to the culture that produced them. Cavemen don’t make the Mona Lisa or michaenglo’s David. These works (among many) stand as monuments to a time and place that produced a peak of artistic, scientific, technological and cultural success. Owning and safeguarding those art pieces connects you to the products of the success of that passed civilisation, you carry the memory and product of many people and imply a bright future for the sons and daughters of that culture by holding up their successes above the ravages of war and nature.

Making copies defeats the point and is basically copying someone else’s homework and handing it in as your own. You stripped the point of doing the work to begin with for the sake of ‘spreading the wealth’. You didn’t make better artists that will produce new valuable works, you empowered lazy forgers who should be conservators of the past at best with that skill set.

The aesthetic value is only part of what took and a lot structure and skill to create. Art is not about appearance.

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#214

Post by herodotus » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 4:53 AM UTC

> Thieves have taken advantage of the distraction provided by the public health situation to steal a prize Vincent van Gogh painting from a museum in the Netherlands

Here is the opposite effect: The number of spam phone calls I have received has dropped from two or three most days to zero! Looks like the spammers cannot work remotely, which is really odd!

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#215

Post by dwd » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 5:13 AM UTC

bsder wrote: post #167

iandanforth wrote: post #127

I fully approve of art theft. There should be honor among thieves of course. You shouldn't damage art. But if a painting isn't stolen now and then, well it wasn't worth painting in the first place. Really, what is art for but to enliven the doldrums of the rich? A moment or three of aesthetic pleasure, bragging at parties, but really most days it's just so much wallpaper. No, the true purpose of art is to be stolen.…

> Really, what is art for but to enliven the doldrums of the rich? Art is actually a wealth store so that the rich can trade money between themselves without tracking.

Another example is David Walsh, the founder of MONA in Hobart.

I think I read this in his book, that his interest in art and antiquities started because he needed a way to move his cash winnings from gambling overseas back to Australia.

You can't simply bundle up all your money and board a plane as there are limits on how much hard currency a country will allow you to remove - but not for artwork.

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#216

Post by devspade » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 5:31 AM UTC

iandanforth wrote: post #127

I fully approve of art theft. There should be honor among thieves of course. You shouldn't damage art. But if a painting isn't stolen now and then, well it wasn't worth painting in the first place. Really, what is art for but to enliven the doldrums of the rich? A moment or three of aesthetic pleasure, bragging at parties, but really most days it's just so much wallpaper. No, the true purpose of art is to be stolen.…

Ah yes cheers to the cheeky beggars...and if they had been caught in the act? What then? Surely they'd have given up their foolish ruse and not injured any local constables for tis' just a game?

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#217

Post by dsaasdffd » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 6:00 AM UTC

grawprog wrote: post #134

iandanforth wrote: post #127

I fully approve of art theft. There should be honor among thieves of course. You shouldn't damage art. But if a painting isn't stolen now and then, well it wasn't worth painting in the first place. Really, what is art for but to enliven the doldrums of the rich? A moment or three of aesthetic pleasure, bragging at parties, but really most days it's just so much wallpaper. No, the true purpose of art is to be stolen.…

Or the painting gets sold to someone shady overseas for a private collection and it's never seen again. It's not like in movies, there's no romance or drama to it. Stolen art doesn't benefit the common good.

From someone's point of view, it was stolen from overseas!

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#218

Post by solotronics » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 6:19 AM UTC

analog31 wrote: post #197

alxmdev wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we're talking about a painting that was sitting in a museum, stored and cared for in ideal conditions and available to the general public. Sounds like it already fulfilled its purpose, without needing to be stolen and traded around by thieves.

It would be easier and safer for them to trade a certificate that represents the theft of the painting.

I'll bundle these together into a security. Oh and we can sell options contracts on them too!

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#219

Post by KingFelix » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 6:55 AM UTC

But, what if Jan Rudolph de Lorm, the museum director was actually moving it to a safer location and accidentally destroyed it. Jans quick-thinking jumped into play and he called up a few college historian friends and asked for some help.

Jan was able to disable the alarm so her friends could come in and smash the place up, leave evidence that it was stolen, then activated the alarm just at the right time.

Jan had become good friends with Andreas Blühm, the director of the Groninger Museum and finally convinced him to let the Singer Laren museum take it on loan. Jan was so distraught there was no way he could could let himself be seen as an incompetent museum director. He had to cover his tracks.

He convinced his old historian friends to keep quiet about the cover-up by cutting up the remains of the painting and giving them each a piece. A story to be kept in secrecy only handed down each generation.

But Jan forgot one thing.......

Re: Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid

#220

Post by anigbrowl » Tue, Mar 31, 2020, 7:06 AM UTC

elorant wrote: post #194

travisoneill1 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you going to find a specialized consultant expert enough to judge if its fake who also doesn't know that the painting he is looking at was recently stolen from a museum?

I don't think it's that hard to buy discretion if you're willing to pay a hefty fee. Besides how could anyone prove that you actually own the painting? I hire you, I fly you half the way around the world to a remote place where you're to examine the painting for a couple of weeks, you're paid and bye-bye. I'm not saying that I know for a fact that this is how it's happening, but it doesn't seem far-fetched. What I do…

Unusually tricky right now. Plus the number of people who can validate authenticity is quite limited and easily identifiable. A Van Gogh would be hard to forge but not that hard. There's recipes for paint/pigment manufacture going back centuries.