The art detective Arthur Brand announced yesterday via Twitter that two major paintings, one by Salvador Dalí and the other by Tamara de Lempicka, have been recovered seven years after they’d been stolen from a Dutch museum.
The theft took place on May 1, 2009, at the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art in Spanbroek. In broad daylight, a group of armed masked men threatened staff and visitors with a gun and then escaped in a car with the two canvases, AFP reports.
The artworks in question are Dalí’s 1941 surrealist painting Adolescence, depicting the Catalan artist with his nanny, and Lempicka’s 1929 languid and glamorous La Musicienne, which was famously featured in the iconic video clip of Madonna’s 1990 hit single Vogue.
Madonna is in fact a serious collector of Lempicka’s work, and has even loaned several paintings to museums. Besides Vogue, works by Lempicka also appear in her videos for Open Your Heart, Express Yourself, and Drowned World/Substitute for Love, and were featured on the sets of her wildly popular Who’s That Girl and Blond Ambition tours.
Brand told the Dutch daily De Telegraaf that the two paintings were given to a criminal gang in lieu of payment, a practice that is common among criminal groups.
However, “this organization did not want to be found guilty of the destruction or resale of art works,” Brand said, and instead contacted him through a go-between to return the canvases. Brand then handed the paintings to Scotland Yard, who are in contact with the rightful owners, who wish to remain anonymous.