Lost & found

Winter brought mixed news on the European art-heist front, as one major work was recovered and a raft of others disappeared.

Benvenuto Cellini

On Jan. 22, an exquisite gold-and-ebony saltcellar by Benvenuto Cellini, stolen in 2003 from Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum [see "Front Page," July '03], was found buried in a wooded area north of the city, after the man who filched it, a security systems salesman, Robert Mang, 50, was apprehended by police. Cellini's Saliera (1540-43), depicting the nude Neptune and Ceres cavorting in the waves, with a small basin floating nearby to hold salt, is the only authenticated work in gold by the 16th-century sculptor and memoirist, famed for his skill in precious metals. Valued at an estimated $60 million, it is among the most important works in the Kunsthistorisches collection.

Mang was brazen. In the wee morning hours, having climbed up a scaffolding erected around the museum for sandblasting, he broke through a second-story window, shattered the glass case in which the sculpture was displayed, and fled with the work. The museum came under sharp criticism for lax security. Although a motion detector had registered the break-in, a security guard turned off the alarm, never investigating why it had been triggered. Mang kept the piece under his bed for two years (it measures approximately 10 by 13 inches) before burying it, fearing apprehension. During that time, he made two very complex attempts to collect a ransom of $12 million from the insurance company (once sending Neptune's tiny trident as proof he had the object in his possession). He was finally arrested after a surveillance tape caught him buying the cell phone used to make a last, incriminatory contact.

Henry Moore & Lynn Chadwick

Mang had seen the Saliera during a guided tour of the museum and evidently developed something of an affection for it (the work was found to be only slightly scratched after its years in his custody). More chilling motives are thought to be operating in a spate of thefts of large-scale outdoor sculptures in bronze, some 20 of which have been stolen from around the London area over the past year. Among the most spectacular heists was that of a 2-ton Henry Moore Reclining Figure (1969), removed during the night of Dec. 15 from the grounds of the Henry Moore Foundation, Perry Green, Hertfordshire. Equally bizarre, one of three 6-foot figures in The Watchers (1960) by Lynn Chadwick was hacked off at the feet and likewise spirited away during the night, this time from Roehampton University in southwest London on Jan. 10. In these and the other cases, police say the thieves drove vans or flatbed trucks to the sites to remove the works. In the Moore case, they used a crane to lift the piece--hardly a subtle operation. The prognosis is grim: investigators believe that thieves plan to melt the pieces down for scrap metal. Prices for scrap metal have risen in the past few years, but still represent only a fraction of the sculptures' value as art. The Moore, for example, is worth some $5.3 million intact, but will bring a mere $5,000 as scrap.

Richard Serra & Anish Kapoor

Meanwhile, the Reina Sofia in Madrid admitted on Jan. 17 that a 38-ton, four-part Richard Serra sculpture, Equal-Parallel/Guernica-Bengasi, commissioned by the museum in 1986 and purchased the following year, has gone missing. The work was on display until 1990, when it was placed in a warehouse for the storage of large-scale pieces. Recently, the museum wished to show the Serra again, but discovered that the company that had stored it had gone into receivership in 1998. There is no trace of the sculpture, and investigations are under way. Back in London, another high-end storage firm, Fine Arts Logistics, is being sued by Geneva collector Ofir Scheps for the disappearance from its warehouse of a work in cement and wood by Anish Kapoor. Hole and Vessel (1984), purchased not long ago by Scheps, was in storage pending restoration by the artist.

Edward Munch

Police may have been clever in the retrieval of the Cellini, but two masterpieces by Edvard Munch, The Scream and Madonna, which were stolen in 2004 from the Munch Museum in Oslo [see "Artworld," Oct. '04], have not fared as well. It was revealed at the end of January that police had seen the paintings, cut from their frames, change hands, yet had taken no action. Surveillance photographs show the thieves operating at a farm in Lillestrem, Norway, in September 2004, just a month after the theft. While police say that someday the motivation for their inaction will become clear, the fear is that the paintings may have since been destroyed.

Caravaggio

On a potentially happier note, the French press announced in late January that two paintings hanging for two centuries in an organ loft in the church of St. Anthony in Loches, in the Loire Valley, are believed to be the work of Caravaggio. They are thought to belong to a group of four paintings purchased from the artist by a French minister for Henry IV, Philippe de Bethune, who was an avid collector. Confiscated during the French Revolution, they were given to the parish in 1813. In 1999, curators noticed a coat of arms in the paintings that led to further studies. The works, depicting the Supper at Emmaus and the Incredulity of Thomas, have been scientifically analyzed by Caravaggio specialist Jose Freches, who pronounces them authentic based on their provenance and on technical clues. However, Pierre Rosenberg, former director of the Louvre, is not convinced; he believes them to be good, early copies of paintings hanging elsewhere, at the National Gallery in London and Sanssouci Palace near Potsdam.

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