Earth and Space News: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft

Showing posts with label Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft. Show all posts

Friday, February 3, 2017

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Flinck Obelisk

Summary: The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft exiles one etching, two bronzes and 10 paintings, including the Flinck obelisk, from home March 18, 1990.

"Landscape With an Obelisk," 1638 oil on panel by Dutch Golden Age painter Govert Teuniszoon Flinck (Jan. 25, 1615-Feb. 2, 1660), removed from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum during March 1990 art theft: The Yorck Project, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

A Dutch 17th-century landscape accepts an Egyptian obelisk as insightfully as an early 20th-century museum affords a 21st-century addition 22 years after the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft in Boston, Massachusetts.

The Flinck obelisk historically became part of the Museum collection through misidentifications that brought it into the second-floor Dutch Room 87 years before March 18, 1990. Misattribution as a Rembrandt carried the oil on panel to a tabletop mount where proper attribution confirmed its continued placement back-to-back with Johannes Vermeer's The Concert. Post-theft sightings describe the Manet cafegoer, the Rembrandt seascape and the Vermeer concert and divulge nothing regarding the missing etching, two bronzes and seven other paintings.

The 81-minute, $500-plus million-valued museum robbery exiles one 167-year-old finial (flag topper), one 3,090-plus-year-old beaker and works by two 19th-century French and three 17th-century Dutch painters.

Govert Teuniszoon Flinck (Jan. 25, 1615-Feb. 2, 1660) fit his obelisk, a stone structure with a pyramidal top and a quadrangular base, into a Dutch countryside.

The 27.94-inch- (71-centimeter-) high, 21.44-inch- (54.5-centimeter-) wide Landscape with an Obelisk from 1638 historically gets ringside views onto the gabled, glass skylight-enclosed, summer nasturtium-draped inner courtyard. Museum provenance and purchase records have the £4,500 purchase from the George Rath collection in Budapest, Hungary through Colnaghi & Co., art dealers in London, England. They indicate the English dealers intermediating acquisition through payment in 1900 from Mrs. Gardner's art historian, Bernard Berenson (June 26, 1865-Oct. 6, 1959), on-site in Europe.

Perhaps the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft perpetrators join Berenson's judging the Flinck obelisk "a work of art of exquisite, sweet pathos and profound feeling."

Mrs. John Lowell Gardner's (April 14, 1840-July 17, 1924) will keeps up the entire Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum possessions and premises with a $1 million endowment.

The endowment leaves 30 centuries of decorations and furnishings, in their exact places at Mrs. Gardner's death, for "the education and enjoyment of the public forever." Museum inventories mention among artworks busts, choir books, columns, friezes, letters, manuscripts, paintings, photos, scrolls and tiles in the courtyard and throughout three floors of furnishings. They note among furnishings that simultaneously nudge artwork status andirons, bureaus, candlesticks, chairs, chalices, coffers, glass, lace, mantelpieces, pennants, plates, scepters, sofas, swords, tapestries and textiles.

Off-street windows offer, since the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft, two empty frames tabletop views of marble benches, statues and tiles in the courtyard below.

Italian architect Renzo Piano pulled the reverse of the Flinck obelisk by putting the Museum's glass and steel Addition next to the 15th-century-styled, 19th-century-built, 20th-century-opened Museum.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum quit a vulnerable past with almost all but the endowed collection queuing into the Addition's community-oriented spaces since Jan. 19, 2012. The Museum's simultaneous renovation with the Addition's realization results in the entire property's climate-controlled, theft-insured coverage by covert, low-light, night-vision, pan, tilt and zoom security systems. Police photographs from 27 years ago show only physical evidence of broken frames and glass because of simple video surveillance tapes easily stolen by the thieves.

Heightened, updated security tells the Flinck obelisk and the 12 other Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft casualties that it is safe to come back home.

"Self-Portrait," ca. 1640 oil on panel by Dutch Golden Age painter Govert Flinck, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow, South West Scotland: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

"Self-Portrait," ca. 1640 oil on panel by Dutch Golden Age painter Govert Flinck, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow, South West Scotland: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Govaert_Flinck_Self_Portrait.jpg

Flinck's landscaped obelisk was displayed in the second-floor Dutch Room, described by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's website as a place for special occasion entertainment by Mrs. Gardner, offering "a stunning view into the courtyard": view of inner courtyard, June 29, 2015: Nic McPhee (Unhindered by Talent), CC BY SA 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/nicmcphee/18660473624/

original Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, a 19th-century building with 15th-century styling, as viewed from 20th century addition by Italian architect Renzo Piano; glassed-in passageway (lower center) connects the addition to the original: Robert Gray (AtHandGuides.com), CC BY 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/55063261@N06/6917282500/

For further information:

"18 U.S. Code § 668 - Theft of Major Artwork." Cornell University Law School > Legal Information Institute > U.S. Code > Title 18 > Part I > chapter 31 > 668.
Available @ https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/668?quicktabs_8=1#quicktabs-8

Baker, Billy. 10 March 2015. "Gardener Keeps Gardner Museum's Atrium in Bloom." Boston Globe > Metro.
Available @ https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/03/09/gardener-keeps-gardner-atrium-bloom/bbSZctlMtkEDy9UDYWrO4K/story.html

Boston Landmarks Commission. Report on the Potential Designation of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum as a Landmark under Chapter 772 of the Acts of 1975, as Amended.
Available @ https://www.cityofboston.gov/images_documents/ISGM%20Study%20Report%20as%20Amended_tcm3-39717.pdf

"Collection." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection

FBI. "FBI Announces Top Ten Art Crimes." Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) > News > Stories > 2005 > November. November 15, 2005.
Available via FBI @ https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2005/november/topten_art111505

FBI. "Gardner Museum in Boston Offering $5 Million Reward for Stolen Art." YouTube. March 8, 2013.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DpD1HbcFfQ

FBI Boston Division. "Boston FBI Continues Hunt for Stolen Artwork." Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) > Boston Division > Press Releases > 2010.
Available via FBI @ https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/boston/press-releases/2010/bs031510.htm

FBI Boston Division. "FBI Provides New Information Regarding the 1990 Isabella Stewart Gardner Art Heist." Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) > Boston Division > Press Releases > 2013.
Available via FBI @ https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/boston/press-releases/2013/fbi-provides-new-information-regarding-the-1990-isabella-stewart-gardner-museum-art-heist

"The Gardner Museum Theft." Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) > FBI Top Ten Art Crimes.
Available @ https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/5-million-reward-offered-for-return-of-stolen-gardner-museum-artwork

"Johannes Vermeer: The Complete Works." Vermeer Foundation.
Available @ http://www.vermeer-foundation.org/

Marriner, Derdriu. 20 January 2017. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Couple." Earth and Space News. Friday.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2017/01/isabella-stewart-gardner-museum-art_20.html

Marriner, Derdriu. 13 January 2017. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Seascape." Earth and Space News. Friday.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2017/01/isabella-stewart-gardner-museum-art_13.html

Marriner, Derdriu. 6 January 2017. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Self-Portrait." Earth and Space News. Friday.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2017/01/isabella-stewart-gardner-museum-art.html

Marriner, Derdriu. 27 January 2017. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Vermeer Concert." Earth and Space News. Friday.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2017/01/isabella-stewart-gardner-museum-art_27.html

Mashberg, Tom. March 1998. "Stealing Beauty." Vanity Fair > Culture.
Available @ http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/1998/03/biggest-art-heist-us-history

Mashberg, Tom. 26 February 2015. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Heist: 25 Years of Theories." New York Times > Arts > Art & Design.
Available @ http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/01/arts/design/isabella-stewart-gardner-heist-25-years-of-theories.html?_r=0

Murphy, Shelley. 17 March 2015. "Search for Artworks from Gardner Heist Continues 25 Years Later." Boston Globe > Metro.
Available @ https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/03/17/gardner-museum-art-heist-one-boston-most-enduring-mysteries-years-later/9U3tp1kJMa4Zn4uClI1cdM/story.html

"Reputed Mobster Arrested, Reportedly Tried to Fence Gardner Museum Art." The Boston Globe. Posted Apr 17, 2015 at 3:14 PM. Updated Apr 18, 2015 at 10:52 PM.
Available @ http://www.telegram.com/article/20150417/NEWS/304179654

"Thirteen Works: Explore the Gardner's Stolen Art." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > Resources > Theft.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft

Thomson, Jason. 3 May 2016. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Theft: Is the Massive Art Heist About to be Solved?" The Christian Science Monitor > USA > USA Update.
Available @ http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2016/0503/Isabella-Stewart-Gardner-theft-Is-the-massive-art-heist-about-to-be-solved

U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts. "Gardner Museum Surveillance Excerpt." YouTube. Aug. 6, 2015.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSw1BsJEBB4

Vila, Bob. 31 October 2011. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBOGMbOoZPA

WBUR. 12 March 2009. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irBRWMMHOI8

Williams, Paige. March 2010. "The Art of the Story." Boston Magazine > Gardner Museum > Gardner Museum Theft.
Available @ http://www.bostonmagazine.com/2010/03/gardner-heist/3/

Friday, January 27, 2017

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Vermeer Concert

Summary: The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft gets an etching, two bronzes and 10 paintings, including the Vermeer Concert, as of March 18, 1990.

"The Concert," oil on canvas painted by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer, depicts a trio of musicians; inserted into sedate musical scene is copy of Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen's raucous "The Procuress" (upper right, above singer); "The Concert" numbers among 11 paintings stolen from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Sunday, March 18, 1990: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Vermeer Concert quickly ascends to the top 10 places on lists, including those by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), since the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft in Boston, Massachusetts.

The Concert belongs in first place, at almost equivalent to the combined values of one etching, two bronzes and nine paintings missing since March 18, 1990. It counts among 34 paintings firmly attributed, not among those questionably attributed, to Delft-born painter Johannes Vermeer (Oct. 31, 1632-Dec. 15, 1675) of the Dutch Republic. It dates back to about 1665 and, like the similarly ferreted Rembrandt couple, draws viewers into a Dutch room that dwells within the second-floor Dutch Room.

The Concert epitomizes the four-story, 115-year-old, 2,500-piece Museum as Mrs. John Lowell Gardner's (April 14, 1840-July 17, 1924) first major auction purchase abroad Dec. 5, 1892.

An empty frame atop a table mount faces similarly empty wall-hanging frames and finds itself back-to-back with another empty frame, from thieves feigning Boston police employment.

The Vermeer Concert, a 28.56-inch- (72.5-centimeter-) high, 25.5-inch- (64.7-centimeter-) wide oil on canvas, gets an estimated value of $200-plus million out of a total $500-plus million. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum provenance and purchase records have Mrs. Gardner, outside the Hotel Drouot sales room in Paris, France, handkerchief movement-coded messaging agent Fernand Robert. They indicate a purchase price of 31,175 French francs at the estate auction of art critic Étienne-Joseph-Théophile Thoré (called Théophile Thoré-Bürger, June 23, 1807-April 30, 1869).

The Vermeer Concert historically juggles, before the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft, a real painting within a Dutch room within the Dutch Room's Vermeer painting.

"The Procuress," 1622 oil on canvas by Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen; Johannes Vermeer painted the example of the vrolijk gezelschap ("merry company") style of Dutch genre painting into two of his artworks, "The Concert" (ca. 1664) and "Lady Seated at a Virginal" (ca. 1670-1672); Museum of Fine Arts, Boston: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Massachusetts' Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) keeps among its collection The Procuress of 1622 by Wijk bij Duurstede-born Dutch painter Dirck van Baburen (1595?-Feb. 21, 1624).

The Procuress looks out from the wall behind the trio in the Vermeer Concert just as the real painting presently looks out from the MFA's walls. The oil on canvas manipulates victimless interactions among one man and two women and measures 40 inches (101.6 centimeters) high by 42.4 inches (107.6 centimeters) wide. The Procuress nudges a landscape painting that nestles a windswept tree just above the heads of the man and the two women in the Vermeer Concert.

Provenance and purchase records offer among The Procuress' previous owners the mother-in-law of its copyist in Vermeer's Concert, an Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft casualty.

The oil on canvas owned by Maria Thins (1593?-Dec. 27, 1680), mother of Catharina Bolnes (1631?-Dec. 30, 1687), Vermeer's wife, peers at viewers of another Vermeer.

Vermeer queues up a canalscape on the painted underside of the instrument's top lid and The Procuress on the wall behind Lady Seated at a Virginal. The 20.3-inch- (51.5-centimeter-) high, 17.9-inch (45.5-centimeter-) wide canvas, regarded a firmly attributed Vermeer of 1670 to 1675, receives visitors to the National Gallery in London, England. Comparative viewing of the Baburen painting with its copy within a Vermeer artwork nowadays suggests a half-day flight to London, not a five-minute walk in Boston.

A renovated museum and a 70,000-square-foot (6,503.21-square-meter) addition teem with increased patronage while placeholders toll 2017 in without the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft casualties.

"A Lady Seated at a Virginal," one of two paintings into which Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer painted Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen's "The Procuress"; with the theft of "The Concert," only Vermeer's "Lady Seated at a Virginal" remains to exemplify Vermeer's reproduction of "The Procuress"; National Gallery, London: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

"The Concert," painted by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer, depicts a trio of musicians; the oil on canvas painting numbers among 11 paintings stolen from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Sunday, March 18, 1990: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vermeer_The_concert.JPG

"The Procuress," 1622 oil on canvas by Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen; Johannes Vermeer painted the example of the vrolijk gezelschap ("merry company") style of Dutch genre painting into two his artworks; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dirck_van_Baburen_-_The_Procuress_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

"A Lady Seated at a Virginal," one of two paintings into which Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer Johannes painted Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen's "The Procuress" in two of his paintings; with the theft of "The Concert," only Vermeer's "Lady Seated at a Virginal" remains to exemplify Vermeer's reproduction of "The Procuress"; National Gallery, London: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lady_Seated_at_a_Virginal,_Vermeer,_The_National_Gallery,_London.jpg

For further information:

"18 U.S. Code 668 - Theft of Major Artwork." Cornell University Law School > Legal Information Institute > U.S. Code > Title 18 > Part I > chapter 31 > 668.
Available @ https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/668?quicktabs_8=1#quicktabs-8

"Collection." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection

FBI. 15 November 2005. "FBI Announces Top Ten Art Crimes." Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) > News > Stories > 2005 > November.
Available via FBI @ https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/news/stories/2005/november/topten_art111505

FBI. 8 March 2013. "Gardner Museum in Boston Offering $5 Million Reward for Stolen Art." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DpD1HbcFfQ

"Johannes Vermeer: The Complete Works." Vermeer Foundation.
Available @ http://www.vermeer-foundation.org/

Mashberg, Tom. March 1998. "Stealing Beauty." Vanity Fair > Culture.
Available @ http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/1998/03/biggest-art-heist-us-history

"Reputed Mobster Arrested, Reportedly Tried to Fence Gardner Museum Art." The Boston Globe > Posted Apr 17, 2015 at 3:14 PM > Updated Apr 18, 2015 at 10:52 PM.
Available @ http://www.telegram.com/article/20150417/NEWS/304179654

"Thirteen Works: Explore the Gardner's Stolen Art." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > Resources > Theft.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft

WBUR. 17 March 2010. "'The Concert' by Johannes Vermeer." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrPqiGIJYYs

WBUR. 12 March 2009. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irBRWMMHOI8

Williams, Paige. March 2010. "The Art of the Story." Boston Magazine > Gardner Museum > Gardner Museum Theft.
Available @ http://www.bostonmagazine.com/2010/03/gardner-heist/3/

Friday, January 20, 2017

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Couple

Summary: The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft March 18, 1990 claims an etching, two bronzes and 10 paintings, including a Rembrandt couple in black.

Stolen from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum during the March 1990 art heist, Rembrandt van Rijn's "A Lady and Gentleman in Black" has a mysterious back story, with the x-ray revelation of the artist's painting over a child and a ball-chasing dog placed to the right of the black-robed lady: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Rembrandt couple, A Lady and Gentleman in Black, avoids self-depictions in the artist's two other artworks of likewise unknown whereabouts since the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft in Boston, Massachusetts.

The theft of one beaker, one finial, one Manet, one Vermeer, three Rembrandt artworks and five Degas brand it the United States' largest private art heist. Any suspects cannot be prosecuted since the statute of limitations in effect March 18, 1990, expanded to 20 years since 1994, concerns the five succeeding years. Security chief Anthony P. Amore describes as Museum reward eligibility requirements "information that leads directly to the recovery of all of our items in good condition."

The reward, enlarged from $1 million to $5 million since 1997, ensures informants anonymous payment through attorneys since "It's time for these paintings to come home."

The Rembrandt couple, the Rembrandt seascape and the Rembrandt self-portrait furnish different perspectives on Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn's (July 15, 1606-Oct. 4, 1669) output for 1633.

A Lady and Gentleman in Black generates dark, sparse impressions, the Rembrandt seascape gives bold, busy looks and the Rembrandt self-portrait goes for delicate, delightful touches. It holds second place, with a 51.81-inch (131.6-centimeter) height and a 42.94-inch (109-centimeter) width, after the Rembrandt seascape, for most conspicuous of the 13 missing artworks. Its empty frame is in its inventoried place on the second-floor Dutch Room wall, to the left of the equally empty placeholder for the Rembrandt seascape.

Historic overlaps at a different time in a different place join the two Rembrandt paintings' historic physical proximity before the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum keeps the provenance and the purchase records for its 2,500 existing art pieces and for the 13 artworks missing since 1990.

Museum records list the Rembrandt couple as purchased in September 1898 for 13,000 pounds and the Rembrandt seascape as purchased in November 1898 for 6,000 pounds. They mention the Rembrandt couple's and the Rembrandt seascape's arrivals Nov. 22 and 24, 1898 at Museum agent Fernand Robert's building, 30 Rue Joubert, Paris, France. They note their insured values at 325 and 150 French francs, after receipt from Colnaghi & Co. of London, England, and prefatory to shipping to Boston.

Nineteenth-century prices and values offer the reverse of what the Rembrandt couple and the Rembrandt seascape hypothetically obtain after the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft.

Museum records preserve Mrs. Gardner's reaction to acquiring the Rembrandt seascape and art historian Bernard Berenson's (June 26, 1865-Oct. 6, 1959) to obtaining the Rembrandt couple.

The theft-related section on the Museum's website quotes Mrs. Gardner as writing Berenson that "Your description of the sea picture makes me fairly ache for it!" Berenson revels in two "quiet, refined people, lined in a dignified, distinguished way, and not scamped, and dashed off as so many of Rembrandt's pictures are." Theft perhaps separates the paintings, together since the Museum's opening Jan. 1, 1903, as sightings specify the Manet cafegoer, the Rembrandt seascape and the Vermeer concert.

The Rembrandt couple historically takes viewers into A Lady and Gentleman in Black's Dutch room, until the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft turns everything topsy-turvy.

1894 oil on canvas portrait of "Isabella Stewart Gardner in Venice" by Swedish artist Anders Zorn (Feb. 18, 1860-Aug. 22, 1920); Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Stolen from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum during the March 1990 art heist, Rembrandt van Rijn's "A Lady and Gentleman in Black" has a mysterious back story, with x-ray revelation of the artist's painting over a child and a ball-chasing dog placed to the right of the black-robed lady: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A_lady_and_gentleman_in_black,_by_Rembrandt.jpg

Circa 1633 etching,"Self Portrait Wearing a Soft Cap: Full Face, Head Only," numbers among a trio of artworks by Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt van Rijn stolen in a single morning, March 18, 1990, from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_-_Self_portrait_etching_-_ISGM.jpg

"Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee," only known seascape by Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt van Rijn, has shared dates of creation and of theft with two other Rembrandt artworks; about two months separate Isabella Stewart Gardener's purchases of "A Lady and Gentleman in Black" and of Rembrandt's only known seascape: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_Christ_in_the_Storm_on_the_Lake_of_Galilee.jpg

1894 oil on canvas portrait of "Isabella Stewart Gardner in Venice" by Swedish artist Anders Zorn (Feb. 18, 1860-Aug. 22, 1920); Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zorn,_Anders_-_Isabella_Stewart_Gardner_in_Venice_-_1894.jpg

For further information:

"Collection." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection

FBI. 8 March 2013. "Gardner Museum in Boston Offering $5 Million Reward for Stolen Art." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DpD1HbcFfQ

"Johannes Vermeer: The Complete Works." Vermeer Foundation.
Available @ http://www.vermeer-foundation.org/

Mashberg, Tom. March 1998. "Stealing Beauty." Vanity Fair > Culture.
Available @ http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/1998/03/biggest-art-heist-us-history

"Thirteen Works: Explore the Gardner's Stolen Art." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > Resources > Theft.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft

WBUR. 12 March 2009. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irBRWMMHOI8

WBUR. 19 March 2010. "'A Lady and Gentleman in Black' by Rembrandt van Rijn.'" YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iHf8dmQYbg

Williams, Paige. March 2010. "The Art of the Story." Boston Magazine > Gardner Museum > Gardner Museum Theft.
Available @ http://www.bostonmagazine.com/2010/03/gardner-heist/3/

Friday, January 13, 2017

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Seascape

Summary: The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft hides an etching, two bronzes and 10 paintings, including the only Rembrandt seascape, since March 18, 1990.

"Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee," only known seascape by Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt van Rijn, stolen March 18, 1990, from Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's Dutch Room: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The only Rembrandt seascape, Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee, appears on lists of the 13 artworks missing since the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft March 18, 1990.

Total length and total width bump the oil on canvas into the most conspicuous category of the museum's bustled-off etching, two art objects and 10 paintings. The size and the subject, the story of Jesus calming waves and winds, converge to call up the most credible post-theft sightings from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania. Tom Mashberg of the Boston Herald describes discerning Aug. 18, 1997 frayed edges and Rembrandt's signature on "arguably the most famous missing painting in the world."

Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Geoffrey Kelly exposes its attempted sale in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 2003, according to a witness deemed credible by the FBI.

The Rembrandt seascape finds itself on a handwritten list of the artworks, with their black market value, in the course of FBI searches May 2, 2012.

Elene Guarente's testimony in 2010 regarding husband Robert F. Guarente's giving away, in Portland, Maine, in 2003, possibly stolen paintings generate FBI searches two years later. Searches of Guarente acquaintance Robert V. Gentile's ranch-style residence in Manchester, Connecticut, harvest from the basement the list tucked inside a Boston Herald from March 1990. Assistant U.S. Attorney John H. Durham indicating, for District Court in Hartford April 17, 2015, Gentile's attempted fences with undercover FBI inspires searches May 2, 2016.

Stealing Beauty by Tom Mashberg for Vanity Fair's March 1998 issue juggles different names while joining attempted recoveries of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft.

sample of alizarin, organic compound comprising main ingredient in red lake pigments favored by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer; paint chips provided to Boston Herald reporter Tom Mashberg as alleged scrapings from Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art heist, have been matched by leading conservator Hubert von Sonnenburg (1928-July 16, 2004) to Vermeer's expensive pigment palette: Ben (Benjah-bmm27), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Mashberg article keeps the viewing location of the Rembrandt seascape as an old warehouse across from a "decrepit low-rise housing project" in Brooklyn, New York.

The viewing leads in October 1997 to receipt of paint chips and 25 negatives from William P. Youngworth III, Boston antiques dealer arranging the warehouse visit. Electron and polarized-light microscopic testing by Walter C. McCrone of Chicago, Illinois, in 1997 makes them 350-year-old chips from where the Rembrandt seascape possibly was painted. Hubert von Sonnenburg's re-examinations, in 2003, at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, note exact matches with Johannes Vermeer's (Oct. 31, 1632-Dec. 15, 1675) red-lake pigment.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft obtains, as its two most expensive artworks, one of 34 firmly attributed Vermeer paintings and the only Rembrandt seascape.

"The Concert," painted by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer, joins Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt van Rijn's "Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee" as the two most expensive artworks stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

New Testament synoptic gospel passages from Luke 8:22-25, Mark 4:35-41 and Matthew 8:23-27 prompt Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn's (July 15, 1606-Oct. 4, 1669) seascape of 1633.

Mashberg quotes Myles J. Connor Jr., samurai swords collector and Youngworth acquaintance: "Everyone loves the thought of owning a Rembrandt, if only for a little while." The 63- by 50.38-inch (160- by 128-centimeter) oil on canvas reveres autobiographical proclivities in the self-depicted, turquoise-clad disciple and Dutch Reformed Church emphases upon biblical knowledge. It supports Connor's observation if not him, his associates Bobby Donati and David Houghton, and Youngworth as Agent Kelly's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft suspects.

Anthony P. Amore, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum security chief, theorizes that "Mrs. Gardner would have expected us to battle every day to get back her art."

An empty frame marks display place in the Dutch Room for Rembrandt's only seascape: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

"Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee," only known seascape by Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt van Rijn, stolen Sunday, March 18, 1990, from Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's Dutch Room: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_Christ_in_the_Storm_on_the_Lake_of_Galilee.jpg

An empty frame marks display place in the Dutch Room for Rembrandt's only seascape: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Empty_Frames_at_Isabella_Stewart_Gardner_Museum.jpg

For further information:

"Collection." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection

FBI. 8 March 2013. "Gardner Museum in Boston Offering $5 Million Reward for Stolen Art." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DpD1HbcFfQ

"Johannes Vermeer: The Complete Works." Vermeer Foundation.
Available @ http://www.vermeer-foundation.org/

Mashberg, Tom. March 1998. "Stealing Beauty." Vanity Fair > Culture.
Available @ http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/1998/03/biggest-art-heist-us-history

"Thirteen Works: Explore the Gardner's Stolen Art." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > Resources > Theft.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft

WBUR. 12 March 2009. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irBRWMMHOI8

WBUR. 18 March 2010. "'The Storm on the Sea of Galilee' by Rembrandt Van Rijn.'" YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3t0JQ0f2AvQ

Williams, Paige. March 2010. "The Art of the Story." Boston Magazine > Gardner Museum > Gardner Museum Theft.
Available @ http://www.bostonmagazine.com/2010/03/gardner-heist/3/

Friday, January 6, 2017

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Art Theft: Rembrandt Self-Portrait

Summary: The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft of two bronzes, 10 paintings and one obscure Rembrandt self-portrait is unsolved since March 18, 1990.

Rembrandt Harmonszoon van Rijn's "Self Portrait Wearing a Soft Cap: Full Face, Head Only" (1633) was one of three Rembrandt paintings removed during the March 1990 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

A postage stamp-sized drawing purchased March 18, 1886, for $120 accounts for one of the 13 artworks removed during the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft in Boston, Massachusetts, March 18, 1990.

The Rembrandt self-portrait brings to three the number of art pieces by one Dutch draughtsman, painter and printmaker to be borne away during the 81-minute robbery. It contributes to the $500 million value of the theft the morning after Saint Patrick's Day even though another artist's painting claims almost half that total. The 1.75- by 1.94-inch (4.45- by 4.92-centimeter) etching, described as Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and as Self-Portrait, most likely dates from 1633.

The autoportrait by Rembrandt Harmonszoon van Rijn (July 15, 1606-Oct. 4, 1669) of Leiden, Netherlands, emerges as a possible pinch-hit for a nearby artwork's botched theft.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, known historically as Fenway Court and locally as the palace, fits between Palace Road intersections with Fenway and with Tetlow Street.

The buff-brick rectangular palace atop a rock-faced ashlar granite foundation gives the surrounding culturally and educationally prominent Fenway neighborhood the look of a 15th-century Venetian palazzo. Its hipped red Spanish tile roof has exposed purlins (horizontal beams), overhanging eaves, projecting chimneys and a skylight whose gabled glass helps light the interior courtyard. The enclosed interior courtyard with 400 to 500 potted plants rotated every six weeks is the pretext that initiates the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft.

Security guard Richard Abath judges purported courtyard disturbances justification to buzz in two Boston policemen at 1:24 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (6:24 a.m. Coordinated Universal Time).

Motion detectors keep track of the two thieves' progression through the second-floor Dutch Room and Short Gallery but they keep nothing from the first-floor Blue Room.

Blue Room records list only the footsteps of the security guard's patrol at 12:27 and 12:53 a.m. EST (6:27 and 6:53 a.m. UTC) before the theft. Empty frames mark the places of one painting moved from the Blue Room, four paintings from the Dutch Room and five paintings from the Short Gallery. Similar placeholders note the Dutch Room's nabbed Rembrandt self-portrait and Shang Dynasty gu (bronze beaker) and the Short Gallery's nipped bronze Napoleonic flagstaff finial (ornamental top).

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft offers another oddity in not obtaining the world-famous Europa by Italian Renaissance painter Tiziano Vecellio (Titian, 1488?-Aug. 27, 1576).

The crime scene photographs present the oil on oak panel, 35.5- by 28.9-inch (89.7- by 73.5-centimeter) Rembrandt Self-Portrait, Age 23 of 1629 as an intended target.

Unsuccessful attempts to remove the painting from its heavy frame qualify as the apparent reason for leaving the panel on the floor of the Dutch Room. Stolen surveillance tapes undoubtedly reveal whether the ink-on-paper etching, also called Self Portrait Wearing a Soft Cap: Full Face, Head Only, was removed deliberately or opportunistically. The 1633 self-portrait's frame stands on the side of a 17th-century carved oak cabinet under the rehanged 1629 self-portrait, purchased for 3,000 pounds Feb. 16, 1896.

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum art theft triggers a $5 million reward for information that brings back the beaker, etching, finial and paintings in good condition.

Rembrandt Harmonszoon van Rijn's "Self-Portrait, Age 23" (1629) escaped theft because of its heavy frame: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Rembrandt Harmonszoon van Rijn's "Self-Portrait, Age 23" (1629) escaped theft because of its heavy frame: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rembrandt_van_Rijn_198.jpg

For further information:

"Collection." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/collection

FBI. 8 March 2013. "Gardner Museum in Boston Offering $5 Million Reward for Stolen Art." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DpD1HbcFfQ

Mashberg, Tom. March 1998. "Stealing Beauty." Vanity Fair > Culture.
Available @ http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/1998/03/biggest-art-heist-us-history

"Thirteen Works: Explore the Gardner's Stolen Art." Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum > Resources > Theft.
Available @ http://www.gardnermuseum.org/resources/theft

WBUR. 12 March 2009. "Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irBRWMMHOI8

Williams, Paige. March 2010. "The Art of the Story." Boston Magazine > Gardner Museum > Gardner Museum Theft.
Available @ http://www.bostonmagazine.com/2010/03/gardner-heist/3/