Stolen van Gogh painting returned in an IKEA bag

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/dutch-art-detective-recovers-a-van-gogh-stolen-in-2020-180982896/

by Brajeshwar • 3 years ago

248 88 3 years ago

smithsonianmag.com

lamplovin• 3 years ago

It's like a real life adaptation of the book, Goldfinch

unreal6• 3 years ago

One of my favorite novels of all time

munificent• 3 years ago

Can you give me some thoughts on what you enjoyed about the book? I read it several years ago after reading many many glowing reviews but I just couldn't get much out of the book at all. What did I miss?

adolph• 3 years ago

I wonder if Nils will get his $9M back?

Authorities arrested the culprit behind the heist in April 2021. . . . A Dutch court sentenced Nils to eight years in prison and ordered him to pay nearly $9 million in compensation to the owner of the Hals.

After Nils’ arrest, the painting circulated in the criminal underworld, where it was used a down payment. But nobody was willing to buy it, as “the thieves had been convicted, and anybody possessing it would risk a hefty fine,” writes Claire Moses for the New York Times.

mikey_p• 3 years ago

Tha Hals is a different painting than the van Gogh.

petre2• 3 years ago

Prosecutors believe Nils stole the van Gogh on the orders of Peter Roy K., a Dutch shipping mogul involved in drug smuggling, who hoped to use the artwork as leverage for negotiating a reduced prison sentence

Roy K: "Two years for the stolen van Gogh?"

Prosecutor: "Right. On top of what you got for dealing drugs?"

onlyrealcuzzo• 3 years ago

Wait. Am I reading this right?

Did he commit a crime to get less jail time?

Wouldn't this be like kidnapping the police chief's child to try to get less prison time?

Someone please tell me it didn't work.

saikatsg• 3 years ago

Meet Gerald Blanchard, who did something similar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Blanchard

cherrycherry98• 3 years ago

I was shocked to learn that this is a thing but it does happen. Organized crime groups steal art that they can use to negotiate lighter sentences.

It is believed that the Mafia stole Rembrandt's "Storm in the Sea of Galilee", among other works from the Gardner Museum for this reason. The documentary series "This Is a Robbery" goes into this heist and is a good watch.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Is_a_Robbery https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Stewart_Gardner_Mus...

WeylandYutani2• 3 years ago

In the Dutch system the judge has the last word not the prosecution so no it doesn't work.

mschuster91• 3 years ago

An ages old tactic, take someone or in this case something hostage to be ransomed for letting someone get out of jail. The most well-known cases in Germany involved the RAF (the left-wing terrorists, not the British Air Force), but it also works with nation states such as China taking two Canadians hostage to exchange them against a Huawei executive, or in war times with spy and prisoner-of-war exchanges.

The thing is, the stakes for something like that are super high, at least as a criminal as you need someone/something that is immeasurably valuable, stuff like the Crown Jewels or a masterpiece worth many millions of dollars, as a starter for negotiations - and that is usually just as well protected.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detention_of_Michael_Spavor_an...

EA• 3 years ago

BTW: those durable plastic carry bags from IKEA are a bit of a lifehack for me. They are just a few USD each and they carry a lot of volume and weight. I keep a couple folded up in my vehicle and in the garage. They are great for carrying lots of groceries, firewood, and other items...such as valuable pieces of art.

sva_• 3 years ago

Some even make backpacks out of them. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13013868

neilv• 3 years ago

https://web.archive.org/web/20200301084451/http://sandiegomi...

jetrink• 3 years ago

Also dogs! New York banned dogs on the subway unless they fit in a bag or other container, so New Yorkers have been dressing their dogs in Ikea bags with four holes cut in the bottom.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/10yzyq6/nycs_answer_t...

wkat42422• 3 years ago

A few USD?? Wow here they're 50 euro cents

TylerE• 3 years ago

$0.99. Probably .9 euro or something.

blamazon• 3 years ago

There's different kinds of those bags. My favorite is a rectangular prism, has a zipper and backpack straps and sells for like $4.99. I think it may have been discontinued in my area, or it is of sporadic availability?

swader999• 3 years ago

They work well for bullion too.

victorbjorklund• 3 years ago

And laundry! That is what we use them for in sweden!

Ylpertnodi• 3 years ago

...and water.

JeremyNT• 3 years ago

They are exactly the right size to hold a Brompton folding bike. Some people add padding and check their bikes in these as luggage!

here4U• 3 years ago

I guess the IKEA bag was stolen too

2-718-281-828• 3 years ago

Stolen IKEA bag returned with van Gogh painting in it.

iamnotsure• 3 years ago

Stolen attention returned in a HN comment.

CobrastanJorji• 3 years ago

Wait a second, can attention be returned?

Like, I can take attention with billboards and pop-up ads and flashy lights and loud noises, but is there some way I could do something that would do the opposite?

I suppose I could destroy other people's advertising, but that's more reducing the theft. I suppose some organizational tools might count? What's the opposite of taking attention?

tspike• 3 years ago

Giving attention? Actively investing your attention in someone else’s wellbeing?

zamalek3• 3 years ago

After watching way too much Baumgartner Restoration, do paintings with such status receive much conservatorship? The varnish on that painting is obnoxiously aged.

toyg• 3 years ago

They do, but I expect it becomes a big political issue - can you imagine how much it must cost in insurance alone, as soon as you mention the painting might have to be touched...? And then you'll need a committee to agree on how much varnish should be stripped, etc etc.

greggsy• 3 years ago

An experienced conservationist would know exactly what to do, and scope the work accordingly. It would go on show for a short period to capitalise on the current interest and attract foot traffic to the gallery, before being treated.

internet101010• 3 years ago

They'll just have someone do it for free in exchange for IP rights so that nobody can ever take a photo of it.

rasz2• 3 years ago

Similar dilemmas in vintage car collecting circles. Some like them fully restored to pristine condition, others leave patina and every imperfection as is. For example this “King Leopold” Bugatti 59 https://youtu.be/MzZIk05pAJ8?feature=shared&t=1017 sold for $12mil few years back https://luxurylaunches.com/auctions/a-vintage-bugatti-type-5...

zamalek3• 3 years ago

After further research, can Gogh might have used paints with ingredients that brown over time. What a pity!

Aunche• 3 years ago

As the name implies Baumgartner is a restorer, not a conservator. Conservators tend to consider his methods rather aggressive, though I imagine part of it is being envious of his popularity. If you just want to spend a moderate sum of money to make your family heirloom look nice, you probably don't care about the .01% of original paint that gets lost.

AdamJacobMuller4• 3 years ago

If you watch his channel, he absolutely considers himself a conservator.

zamalek3• 3 years ago

I'm genuinely interested to read some of these critiques that you are referring to.

AdamJacobMuller4• 3 years ago

I'm not the only technical person who likes his channel!

His channel hits this incredible niche between science (his knowledge of how the various cleaning methods, glues, paints and varnishes he uses interact with each other is amazing), the technical (one of the first videos of his I saw was the vacuum table build and the rigs he's built to save some of the wood panel paintings are amazing), and the meditative (as he would say, sometimes there is no better way to clean a painting than sitting there for 12, 24, 72 hours with cotton balls).

I'm a bit sad that they don't allow someone like him to work on paintings of this vintage. I know a Van Gogh is extraordinarily perhaps incalculably valuable but I would absolutely love to see paintings as they were when the artist first painted them (or at least closer), especially Van Gogh. The transformations on some the paintings Baumgartner has done are astonishing and can completely change the tone or meaning of a painting.

1MachineElf• 3 years ago

If this was all an elaborate ruse to make us want to go shopping at IKEA, then I'll concede that it worked.

moffkalast• 3 years ago

Reminds me of that Rembrandt/Renoir heist, a classic documentary by the Internet Historian.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPlFdIpgioI

paulpauper• 3 years ago

hard, if not impossible to sell it. that is the problem with stolen artwork from the perspective of thief

londons_explore3• 3 years ago

Someone who is really good at finding lost artworks hey....?

Is there good evidence that this guy or his friends didn't steal the artworks in the first place?

deepsun• 3 years ago

Same thoughts. It's hard to navigate the criminal underworld having clean clothes yourself.

But the painting is back.

muzani• 3 years ago

He did literally write a book on infiltrating the Nazi underground to get artwork back.

https://www.amazon.com/Hitlers-Horses/dp/1529106109

civilitty• 3 years ago

The thief left DNA evidence at the scene and eventually pleaded guilty. The person in TFA didn't "find" the artwork, someone came to him with it in order to arrange a handover without getting into legal trouble themselves.

rasz2• 3 years ago

without getting into legal trouble themselves.

How would that work? Police: Hey thanks for returning stolen property, since it was in your possession we will charge you now, that is unless we learn who gave it to you.

wkat42422• 3 years ago

They bought the wrong VÅNGØGH and wanted to return it

UberFly• 3 years ago

Anyone who enjoys these kind of stories should check out the series "Raiders of the Lost Art". They are on Curiosity Stream and maybe elsewhere. Good stuff.

User23• 3 years ago

I wonder if an ethical collector was viewing to buy and said something like “the only way it’s leaving here with you is with the police. Are you staying or leaving it?”

stateoff• 3 years ago

If it came in a yellow and not a blue bag, we should have known.

rhaps0dy• 3 years ago

After some searching it appears that the joke here is that yellow bags are meant to stay in IKEA stores, while one can buy blue ones. So a yellow bag must be stolen.

chaxor• 3 years ago

That top image looks like a generated image.

Those hands. Man those hands are wildly big.

Camera angles are powerful.

jjoonathan• 3 years ago

Yeah but there are 8 visible fingers, not 18.

glouwbug• 3 years ago

There’s nothing you can do with a stolen famous painting. It’s essentially worthless as your clientele know it’s worth and that it’s stolen. Stolen art only gains to make the art more famous

fastball• 3 years ago

What do you mean? There are absolutely people willing to buy stolen art.

gitaarik• 3 years ago

In the article it says that the criminals had a hard time selling the stolen painting, and it was mostly used as down payment.

gnulinux2• 3 years ago

What? Aren't stolen high art pieces used as their own currency in the dark web for "priceless" services. I was told that criminals use stolen art for payment and it just goes around one criminal to another. Is this just an urban legend, is it inaccurate?

patmorgan23• 3 years ago

If someone steals the Mona Lisa, who are they going to sell it to get cash?

Why would someone accept a stolen Mona Lisa as payment? How are they going to reliably turn it into cash?

lmm• 3 years ago

You can do the only thing you should be buying a painting for: look at it and enjoy it.

WeylandYutani2• 3 years ago

True. There was an infamous case in the Netherlands were the Bulgarian thieves realised their mistake and burned a million euro painting in their mother's stove to get rid of the evidence.

Criminals contrary to Batman cartoons aren't geniuses.

laxatives• 3 years ago

Sort of like a Goya in a Harrod's handbag?

tomcam• 3 years ago

Prosecutors believe Nils stole the van Gogh on the orders of Peter Roy K., a Dutch shipping mogul involved in drug smuggling, who hoped to use the artwork as leverage for negotiating a reduced prison sentence

That could be the plot of a Tarantino comedy

throwaway161718• 3 years ago

I was hoping to see the IKEA bag as well when I clicked on the link. Slightly disappointed :(

tanepiper• 3 years ago

We have lovely page where you can see them

https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/frakta-carrier-bag-large-blue-1...

sourcecodeplz2• 3 years ago

Hot potato indeed

Stolen van Gogh painting returned in an IKEA bag

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