Canarian Weekly
06-03-2015, 11:40
A STOLEN Picasso painting, recovered in New York, will be returned to the French government.
The Cubist painting La Coiffeuse (The Hairdresser), was smuggled into the US from Belgium last December in a parcel masquerading as a £24 gift. It was intercepted by US customs and subsequently seized.
Authorities say the 1911 painting, said to be worth at least £1.6m, disappeared from a Paris storeroom at the Pompidou Centre.
It was reported missing in November 2001, when gallery officials were unable to locate it following a loan request.
The New York Times reported on 17th December that a person named “Robert”, with an address in Belgium, shipped the oil-painting marked as “Happy Christmas” and labelled as “art craft/toy”.
The identity of the person to whom it was sent has not been released. But French officials later travelled to New York and confirmed the painting’s provenance.
“A lost treasure has been found,” said Loretta Lynch, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, who filed a civil suit to return the painting to France.
The New York Times was told by an agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations: “The market to sell stolen antiquities in the US is drying up.”
The painting, part of the Musee National d’Art Moderne collection, was last displayed in Munich in 1998.
More... (http://www.canarianweekly.com/missing-picassos-going-home/)
The Cubist painting La Coiffeuse (The Hairdresser), was smuggled into the US from Belgium last December in a parcel masquerading as a £24 gift. It was intercepted by US customs and subsequently seized.
Authorities say the 1911 painting, said to be worth at least £1.6m, disappeared from a Paris storeroom at the Pompidou Centre.
It was reported missing in November 2001, when gallery officials were unable to locate it following a loan request.
The New York Times reported on 17th December that a person named “Robert”, with an address in Belgium, shipped the oil-painting marked as “Happy Christmas” and labelled as “art craft/toy”.
The identity of the person to whom it was sent has not been released. But French officials later travelled to New York and confirmed the painting’s provenance.
“A lost treasure has been found,” said Loretta Lynch, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, who filed a civil suit to return the painting to France.
The New York Times was told by an agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations: “The market to sell stolen antiquities in the US is drying up.”
The painting, part of the Musee National d’Art Moderne collection, was last displayed in Munich in 1998.
More... (http://www.canarianweekly.com/missing-picassos-going-home/)