The most valuable missing painting in the world
Heists of valuable artworks only happen in the movies, right? Films like Morten Tyldum’s Norwegian thriller Headhunters, Danny Boyle’s 2013 movie Trance about a lost painting, and even Bart Layton’s 2018 coming-of-age drama American Animals feature thieves trying to steal works of art to varying degrees of success, yet for such acts to happen in reality is a rarity, reserved for only a number of extraordinary cases.
One of the most famous cases was when The Mona Lisa, the art world’s most iconic artwork, was stolen from the Louvre in 1911 by an Italian carpenter and two of his handy colleagues. In fact, few people cared too much about the piece by Leonardo da Vinci until it was stolen, with the carpenter, named Vincenzo Peruggia, hiding in a cupboard until the gallery closed in order to steal the painting and fleeing on a train from Paris the next morning.
Quickly gaining global interest, when Peruggia tried to sell the piece, no one was keen to buy it, worried that it would attract a lot of unwanted attention. Instead, he simply hid it underneath the floorboards in his flat until selling it to a Florentine trader 28 months later, who alerted the relevant authorities.
Though Peruggia’s story is indeed interesting, it is not the subject of this article, as we’re looking at the most valuable missing painting in the world, a piece stolen during the Isabella Stewart Gardner heist of 1990.
Known as the largest art heist in history, the events of March 17th, 1990, in Boston, Massachusetts, saw two people impersonating police officers gaining access to the restricted rooms of the museum. The crooks tied up the security guards and took several artworks from their frames before loading them into a hatchback outside the museum, eventually making off with 13 pieces of art that racked up a value of $500million in total.
In their hatchback, they had paintings by the likes of Rembrandt, Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet and, most famously, Johannes Vermeer, whose work The Concert from 1664 became the most valuable piece of stolen art, worth $250million.
Fascinatingly, the 13 pieces stolen from the museum have never been rediscovered, with many claiming foul play, suggesting that the mafia was involved in the scheme or that security was in on the plan. For Geoff Kelly, the FBI agent who is overseeing the investigation of the Gardner break-in, the robbery was the work of gangsters and mafia members who have long since passed away.
Giving his thoughts about the case to The New York Times, Kelly rejects the idea that the paintings were destroyed, stating: “That rarely happens in art thefts…Most criminals are savvy enough to know such valuable paintings are their ace in the hole”.
It’s fitting, though, that Isabella Stewart Gardner, the American art collector who founded the museum, was known as the eccentric, lively character associated with the quote, “Don’t spoil a good story by telling the truth.” The plot indeed thickens.
