Art Shreddies! Now with extra guache!
David Joseph Greenbaum
Well. What is to be said?
$1.5 to $1.7 *billion* notional dollars worth of Cranach, Brueghel,
Watteau, et cetera - pffft. Gone. Forever.
Mireille Breitwieser - you *cow*.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/17/arts/design/17DEST.html
Your Stolen Art? I Threw It Away, Dear
By Alan Riding
PARIS, May 16 — For years Stéphane Breitwieser, a
youthful-looking Frenchman, traveled through Europe working as a
waiter, and in his off hours visited out-of-the-way museums
where he looked for opportunities to walk off with what he
liked. He stashed stolen oil paintings, rare musical instruments
and other art objects in his private collection in his mother's
home in Mulhouse, in eastern France, investigators said.
Last November his luck ran out at a museum in Lucerne,
Switzerland, and he was arrested on charges of stealing a bugle.
On learning of the arrest, the police said, his mother chopped
up the oil paintings, which were left for trash collection, and
dumped other art objects in a canal.
The case has stunned art experts because the 60 paintings and
112 objects that the police say Mr. Breitwieser has admitted
stealing were estimated to be worth at least $1.4 billion. Among
the paintings destroyed were works by Pieter Brueghel the
Younger, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Corneille de Lyon and Watteau.
His mother, Mireille Breitwieser, 51, was arrested on Tuesday on
charges of possessing stolen goods and destroying art.
[...]
According to investigators, Mrs. Breitwieser admitted chopping
up the oils, many of which were painted on wooden panels. She
said that other art objects, which included silver and ivory
statues, 18th-century porcelain and medieval weapons as well as
ancient musical instruments, were thrown in the Rhône-Rhine
Canal, which runs near Mulhouse.
Detectives in Strasbourg, France, who are in charge of the
French side of the investigation, said that some objects were
found in the canal by hikers on Nov. 27, a week after Mr.
Breitwieser's arrest. Subsequently, police officers dredged part
of the canal and found numerous artworks. They also contacted
the Art Loss Register, which identified some objects as having
been stolen from European museums.
But it was only this month, when Swiss investigators requested
permission to interrogate Mrs. Breitwieser in France, that the
connection was made between her son and the objects found in the
canal. Mrs. Breitwieser, who was arrested along with her son's
girlfriend, Anne-Catherine Kleinklauss, appeared to have had no
inkling of the value of the works that she tossed out.
Ms. Smith of the Art Loss Register said that French police
officers had given her a rough estimated of the art's value at
between $1.4 billion and $1.9 billion, although a detailed list
of the artworks involved has not been made. It is unclear
whether that estimate will hold up. "It's difficult to gauge
their value without a full list," she said, "but some paintings,
like Cranach's `Princess of Clèves,' are worth a great deal,
maybe $8 million. In reality, because they are irreplaceable,
they are priceless."
The French daily France Soir, which first reported the story on
Wednesday and appears to have received a detailed briefing from
Strasbourg investigators, said that destroyed works included
Brueghel's "Cheat Profiting From His Master," stolen from a
museum in Antwerp, Belgium, in 1997; Watteau's drawing of "Two
Men," stolen from a museum in Montpellier, France, in 1999;
François Boucher's "Sleeping Shepherd," stolen from a museum in
Blois, France, in 1996; Corneille de Lyon's "Mary, Queen of
Scots," also stolen from the museum in Blois in 1996; and the
Cranach, stolen from a museum in Baden-Baden, Germany, in 1995.
[...]
Dave G.
--
Siamese twins: one, maddened by
The other's moral bigotry,
Resolved at length to misbehave "Twins" Robert Graves
And drink them both into the grave. ca. 1967
Kip Williams
>
> Well. What is to be said?
>
> $1.5 to $1.7 *billion* notional dollars worth of Cranach, Brueghel,
> Watteau, et cetera - pffft. Gone. Forever.
>
> Mireille Breitwieser - you *cow*.
In spades. Cretins are suing to be sure they don't call her one.
> http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/17/arts/design/17DEST.html
> Your Stolen Art? I Threw It Away, Dear
> By Alan Riding
>
> PARIS, May 16 — For years Stéphane Breitwieser, a
> youthful-looking Frenchman, traveled through Europe working as a
> waiter, and in his off hours visited out-of-the-way museums
> where he looked for opportunities to walk off with what he
> liked. He stashed stolen oil paintings, rare musical instruments
> and other art objects in his private collection in his mother's
> home in Mulhouse, in eastern France, investigators said.
>
> Last November his luck ran out at a museum in Lucerne,
> Switzerland, and he was arrested on charges of stealing a bugle.
> On learning of the arrest, the police said, his mother chopped
> up the oil paintings, which were left for trash collection, and
> dumped other art objects in a canal.
...
This is one of the most depressing and infuriating things I've read
in a long time, and I live in the USA in 2002.
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at members.cox.net/kipw
"Well, it looks as though my time is up. The old clock on the wall
has melted." --Hugh "Wavy Gravy" Romney
Kate Schaefer
news:3CE4887A...@cox.net...
> David Joseph Greenbaum wrote:
> >
> > Well. What is to be said?
> >
> > $1.5 to $1.7 *billion* notional dollars worth of Cranach, Brueghel,
> > Watteau, et cetera - pffft. Gone. Forever.
> >
> > Mireille Breitwieser - you *cow*.
>
> In spades. Cretins are suing to be sure they don't call her one.
>
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/17/arts/design/17DEST.html
> > Your Stolen Art? I Threw It Away, Dear
> > By Alan Riding
> >
> > youthful-looking Frenchman, traveled through Europe working as
a
> > waiter, and in his off hours visited out-of-the-way museums
> > where he looked for opportunities to walk off with what he
> > liked. He stashed stolen oil paintings, rare musical
instruments
> > and other art objects in his private collection in his
mother's
> > home in Mulhouse, in eastern France, investigators said.
> >
> > Last November his luck ran out at a museum in Lucerne,
> > Switzerland, and he was arrested on charges of stealing a
bugle.
> > On learning of the arrest, the police said, his mother chopped
> > up the oil paintings, which were left for trash collection,
and
> > dumped other art objects in a canal.
> ...
>
> This is one of the most depressing and infuriating things I've read
> in a long time, and I live in the USA in 2002.
I think that I'm most depressed at the loss of the Cranach. The Breughel
makes me pretty unhappy -- okay, very unhappy -- but we have more examples
of how Breughel saw things than we have of how Cranach saw things.
Charlton Wilbur
> David Joseph Greenbaum wrote:
> >
> > Well. What is to be said?
> >
> > $1.5 to $1.7 *billion* notional dollars worth of Cranach, Brueghel,
> > Watteau, et cetera - pffft. Gone. Forever.
> >
> > Mireille Breitwieser - you *cow*.
>
> In spades. Cretins are suing to be sure they don't call her one.
>
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/17/arts/design/17DEST.html
> > Your Stolen Art? I Threw It Away, Dear
> > By Alan Riding
> >
> > PARIS, May 16 - For years Stephane Breitwieser, a
> > youthful-looking Frenchman, traveled through Europe working as a
> > waiter, and in his off hours visited out-of-the-way museums
> > where he looked for opportunities to walk off with what he
> > liked. He stashed stolen oil paintings, rare musical instruments
> > and other art objects in his private collection in his mother's
> > home in Mulhouse, in eastern France, investigators said.
> >
> > Last November his luck ran out at a museum in Lucerne,
> > Switzerland, and he was arrested on charges of stealing a bugle.
> > On learning of the arrest, the police said, his mother chopped
> > up the oil paintings, which were left for trash collection, and
> > dumped other art objects in a canal.
> ...
>
> This is one of the most depressing and infuriating things I've read
> in a long time, and I live in the USA in 2002.
Yeats said it better than I can:
On their own feet they came, or on shipboard,
Camel-back; horse-back, ass-back, mule-back,
Old civilizations put to the sword.
Then they and their wisdom went to rack:
No handiwork of Callimachus,
Who handled marble as if it were bronze,
Made draperies that seemed to rise
When sea-wind swept the corner, stands;
His long lamp-chimney shaped like the stem
Of a slender palm, stood but a day;
All things fall and are built again,
And those that build them again are gay.[1]
Charlton
[1] "gay" in the old sense of "happy or cheerful", of course.
Martin Wisse
Greenbaum) wrote:
>
>Well. What is to be said?
>
>$1.5 to $1.7 *billion* notional dollars worth of Cranach, Brueghel,
>Watteau, et cetera - pffft. Gone. Forever.
>
>Mireille Breitwieser - you *cow*.
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/17/arts/design/17DEST.html
>Your Stolen Art? I Threw It Away, Dear
>By Alan Riding
I was so fucking furious when I read that, bloody stupid shortsighted
woman.
AAAAGH.
Martin Wisse
--
What most blocking software does best is take up room on your hard drive
and interfere in a random way with your web-browsing.
--Avram Grumer, rasseff.