181–190 of 240 posts
So let me get this straight. A fairly sized museum that holds, possibly, millions worth of art has absolutely no 24/7 security guards at the front door. Not even a single guard.
Come on.
What is the end goal for the thieves? Seeing as you obviously can't sell stolen artwork on the open market- how many insanely wealthy private collectors can there be out there, who are willing to risk substantial prison time to own a stolen painting? I think many or most people who have that much money probably made it legally and don't have that kind of risk tolerance. And I doubt many mob boss/Tony Soprano types re…
The truth is, the aesthete billionaire collector beloved by movies doesn’t much exist. Most truly expensive artwork is bought either as a store of value or to show off. Both require you to be able to publicise you have it.
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Governments should finance teams of thieves to steal those back from private collections and place them back to public museums.
Who says they don't? China's likely smart enough to figure this out: https://www.gq.com/story/the-great-chinese-art-heist
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Interestingly as I understand it part of the point is that by stealing the original you are able to create both better counterfeits and a market for them. Think about it — obviously no one will buy a counterfeit "Starry Night" or whatever if it's hanging in a museum. But if it's stolen, all of a sudden there's the possibility that they can buy the original. Not only that, but the counterfeit, created with extensive a…
The irony in that comment is that one of the Soprano actors is actually an artist (painter) and big art buff and scored big on finding a painting at a dealer that "didn't know what he had".. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/sopranos-actor-discovers-1...
There is no need to put “stolen” in your last sentence.
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.
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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?
These are oil paintings. I don't have much expertise in that but I think it'll be impossible to counterfeit the smallest details.
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.…
This was a smash and grab, no style...
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It's not that easy to sell counterfeit artwork. Anyone who's paying millions for an artwork will have the painting examined by a specialized consultant. The easiest way to spot a fake is to examine the pigments and whether a particular one was available by the time the artist lived. This is how the Rosales scandal was exposed in 2013.
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?