It's not always banks and jewelers that get targeted by thieves endeavoring to steal millions worth of goods. Very often the targets are, in fact, museums and art galleries, and the thieves often have their bullseye set on specific targets. Famous paintings and expensive artworks often become their primary objective. Hence, many famous stolen paintings have fallen victim to the hands of burglars. And although some stolen paintings have been returned to their owners' hands, many's whereabouts remain a mystery.
Arguably the biggest art theft in history, dubbed the Gardner heist or the 1990 theft, in which 13 works of art were stolen, remains a mystery even 30 years later. Among the famous stolen paintings still missing are works by Rembrandt, Caravaggio, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne and many other masterminds who probably never imagined their artworks would ever be worth millions and sought after by federal agencies all over the world. However, the pitfall for both the investigators and the burglars is that stolen artwork is often "too famous to fence." This implies that the criminals are stuck with something they can't sell, which, to a certain degree, complicates the process of tracking down the lost paintings. However, not all hope is lost since the search for the stolen paintings has never ceased, and numerous famous paintings have already made it safely to their rightful owners.
If the history of art theft is something you want to learn more about, below, we've compiled a list of stolen paintings with some background information on how they were stolen. Other than that, we've made it clear to indicate which of the stolen paintings were recovered and which ones are still missing. As always, upvote your favorite pieces and let us know if you know any more details regarding any of the theft cases! And although we do our best to fact-check the information we provide, we would highly appreciate you letting us know if you spot any errors and inaccuracies. And now, on to investigating!
#21 Lady Writing A Letter With Her Maid By Johannes Vermeer
Stolen in 1986 | Retrieved in 1993
In April 1974, armed members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) stole Lady Writing A Letter With Her Maid and other artworks from Sir Alfred Beit's Russborough House residence. Nevertheless, eight days later, the artworks were found. However, the painting was stolen once again in 1986 by a group led by the Irish criminal Martin Cahill. Cahill demanded IR£20 million in exchange for the artwork. However, he never received the money. Ultimately, the painting was recovered during a sting operation run by the Irish police that took place in August 1993 at Antwerp Airport.
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#22 The Love Letter By Johannes Vermeer
Stolen in 1971 | Retrieved later that year
Vermeer's famous work was stolen in September 1971 from The Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels, where it was on loan from the Rijksmuseum. The burglar, Mario Pierre Roymans, 21 at the time, hid in an electrical closet and waited for the museum to close. After removing the painting from the wall, he attempted to flee. But when the frame wouldn't fit through the window, he used a potato peeler to separate the canvas from its frame. He initially kept the painting hidden in a hotel he worked at. Later, he buried it in a forest, but as it started to rain, he dug it out and hid it under his pillowcase in his room. Allegedly, the young man committed theft for 'noble reasons' to raise money to combat world famine. Nevertheless, he was soon apprehended by the police. Though in bad shape, the painting was returned to the Rijksmuseum in October.
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#23 The Parsonage Garden At Nuenen By Vincent Van Gogh
Stolen in 2020 | Still missing
Relatively recently, on March 30, 2020, Van Gogh's birthday (!), the artwork was taken from the Singer Laren museum in Laren, North Holland. The museum had been closed to visitors during the robbery due to the COVID-19 epidemic; hence there were no potential witnesses. According to police, the glass doors were broken, and whoever did this fled before the police arrived. In 2021, a 58-year-old man was detained by Dutch police on suspicion of stealing paintings by Vincent van Gogh and Frans Hals, stolen later the same year. The individual was later found guilty of the offenses and given an eight-year jail term. Unfortunately, neither of the artworks had then been recovered.
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#24 Sulmierzyce Madonna By Lucas Cranach The Elder
Stolen in 1995 | Still missing
This painting has quite an interesting story behind it. The records indicate that the artwork arrived in Sulmierzyce, Poland, in the latter part of the 16th century. The Sulmierski family was meant to transport it elsewhere. According to a local legend, the horses reared up and could not be moved by anybody or anything. This was regarded as providence; hence the picture stayed in Sulmierzyce. On March 15, 1666, church authorities deemed the painting miraculous since it had withstood several fires and plundering by numerous invasion armies. However, it was stolen from the church's main altar in 1995.
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#25 Portrait Of Suzanne Bloch By Pablo Picasso
Stolen in 2007 | Retrieved in 2008
The painting was stolen from the São Paulo Museum of Art in Brazil in December 2007. Three men broke into the museum at five in the morning and stole Picasso's Portrait of Suzanne Bloch along with Portinari's O Lavrador de Café. It's believed that the entire heist operation took roughly three minutes. The paintings were found in January 2008 by the police at Ferraz de Vasconcelos in São Paulo.
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#26 Stammer Windmill By Piet Mondrian
Stolen in 2012 | Retrieved in 2021
2012 saw the theft, now dubbed "theft of the century,” of two famous paintings and a sketch from Greece's National Gallery. In a seven-minute heist, two burglars stole Pablo Picasso's Head of a Woman and Stammer Windmill by Piet Mondrian and Guglielmo Caccia’s sketch St. Diego de Alcala in Ecstasy with the Holy Trinity and the Symbols of Passion. According to ARTnews, just recently, in January 2023, a 50-year-old man who was charged with stealing three works of art from the Greece National Gallery in Athens in January 2012 was given a six-year jail sentence with a suspended prison term.
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#27 Portrait Of A Lady By Gustav Klimt
Stolen in 1997 | Retrieved in 2019
The artwork is believed to have been stolen in February 1997 during building renovations from a modern art gallery in Piacenza, northern Italy. It was thought to have vanished permanently until 2019, when a worker removing ivy from the gallery wall stumbled on a metal panel. A black bag containing what looked to be the lost painting was in a recess behind it. It was the original Portrait of a Lady that had been stripped of its frame. The Galleria officials were overjoyed to learn that new X-rays that matched those from before the 1997 theft had confirmed the painting's authenticity.
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#28 Paysage Bords De Seine By Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Stolen in 1951 | Retrieved in 2012
Paysage Bords de Seine was stolen in November 1951, sometime during the From Ingres to Gauguin exhibition at the Baltimore Museum of Art. The museum sold the painting's title in exchange for a $2,500 insurance payout from an insurance company, which compensated the museum for its loss. Apparently, a woman named Marcia Fuqua brought that same painting to an auction house in Alexandria, Virginia, in July 2012 with the intention of selling it. The artwork was expected to fetch at least $75,000 at auction. According to Fuqua, she paid $7 for the painting at a flea market in West Virginia. However, this was never confirmed. The artwork's title was returned to the Baltimore Museum of Art in 2013.
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#29 Portrait Of A Seated Woman With A Handkerchief By Carel Fabritius
Stolen in 1959 | Retrieved in NIA
Portrait Of A Seated Woman With A Handkerchief was one of six works stolen from the Art Gallery of Toronto in 1959. The burglars targeted the most valuable pieces: Rembrandt's Portrait of a Lady with a Lap Dog and Frans Hals’ Portrait of Isaak Abrahamsz. Massa. However, Woman with a Handkerchief, still considered Rembrandt's work at the time, had the highest value of the stolen items, according to the gallery's insurance. Allegedly, the insurance company eventually paid a ransom to recover the painting.
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#30 Two Laughing Boys With A Mug Of Beer By Frans Hals
Stolen in 2020 | Still missing
This painting has been a "regular" target of theft. It was stolen three times in 1988, 2011, and 2020. The third time it was stolen from the Hofje van Mevrouw van Aerden museum in Leerdam, Netherlands. One explanation for why it is stolen so often is that multiple theft attempts have helped establish its market value, which makes it easier to sell stolen goods. In 2021, a 58-year-old man was detained by Dutch police on suspicion of stealing paintings by Frans Hals and Vincent van Gogh. The individual was later found guilty of the offenses and given an eight-year jail term. Unfortunately, neither of the artworks have since been recovered.
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#31 Portrait Of Georgiana, Duchess Of Devonshire By Thomas Gainsborough
Stolen in 1876 | Retrieved in 1901
After the painting's owner, the art collector Wynne Ellis, passed away, the artwork was put up for sale and purchased by Bond Street art dealer William Agnew. However, just three weeks later, it was stolen from the gallery of Thomas Agnew & Sons in London. Yet it wasn't until 25 years later that the identity of the thief — the renowned Adam Worth, dubbed the "Napoleon of Crime" — was revealed. He had planned to sell it to get the money for his brother's release on bond. Still, once his brother was released without bail, Worth decided to keep it for himself and brought it home to the United States. In early 1901, he offered $25,000 restitution to return the painting to Agnew's son. In March 1901, the painting and cash were exchanged, and the artwork was returned to London.
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#32 Summer's Day By Berthe Morisot
Stolen in 1956 | Retrieved several days later
Two Irish students, Paul Hogan and Billy Fogarty, stole the artwork from the Tate Gallery in London on April 12, 1956. Allegedly, they stole it to emphasize Ireland's claim to the Hugh Lane Bequest. However, several days later, the painting was returned via the Irish Embassy.
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#33 Charcoal Burners By Tom Roberts
Stolen in 1978 | Retrieved in 1979
In August 1978, the art gallery in Ballarat, Australia, saw the robbery of a 92-year-old artwork. Australia's so-called "biggest single art heist" involved a man on crutches with a plastered leg. Even though the theft attracted a lot of media attention, the exact details of the painting's recovery were kept a secret. According to ABC News, the gallery director at the time was eventually contacted by someone from Sydney who claimed to have information about the missing artwork and the chance of its recovery in exchange for a ransom. While the specifics of how the picture was retrieved are still unknown, a ransom was believed to be paid.
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#34 Portrait Of Isaak Abrahamsz. Massa By Frans Hals
Stolen in 1959 | Retrieved 3 weeks after
Portrait Of Isaak Abrahamsz. Massa was stolen along with five others works from the Art Gallery of Toronto in 1959. The painting was found in a Parkdale storage room three weeks after it went missing. It had only sustained minor damage.
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#35 A Soldier On Horseback By Anthony Van Dyck
Stolen in 2020 | Still missing
A Soldier On Horseback was stolen in March 2020 from Christ Church Picture Gallery in England. Salvator Rosa's A Rocky Coast, with Soldiers Studying a Plan and Annibale Carracci's A Boy Drinking were also among the artworks taken by the burglars that evening. According to Christ Church Picture Gallery's recent tweet, the paintings' whereabouts remain unknown.
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#36 La Clairière By Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Stolen in 1987 | Retrieved in 2009
La Clairière was stolen in 1987 with eight other paintings from art dealer Robert Noortman's gallery in Maastricht. According to Antiques Trade Gazette, eight, including works of Camille Pissarro, David Teniers, Willem van de Velde, Jan Brueghel the Younger, Eva Gonzalès, and Paul-Desiré Trouillebert, were recovered in a Dutch sting operation. It is thought that the ninth missing artwork was destroyed.
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#37 Portrait Of Jacob De Gheyn III By Rembrandt
Stolen in 1983 | Retrieved in 1986
The painting has been dubbed "takeaway Rembrandt" because it has been reported as having been stolen four times since 1966, the most of any artwork. In a fourth attempt to steal the painting in 1983, the thief smashed a skylight, entered the art gallery through it, and used a crowbar to pull it from the wall. Within three minutes, the cops showed up, but they were too late to catch the robber. The picture was lost for three years until it was found in a luggage rack at the railway station in Münster, Germany, in 1986.
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#38 Child With A Soap Bubble
Stolen in 1999 | Retrieved in 2014
Although it's been stated that Child with a Soap Bubble is a Rembrandt painting, as was confirmed by Jacques Foucart, former curator of the Nordic paintings at the Louvre, Child with a Soap Bubble is indeed not a Rembrandt painting but rather inspired by him. Nevertheless, the painting was stolen from the Musee Municipal D'art Et D'histoire in Draguignan, France, in 1999 during Bastille Day celebrations. Only after 15 years was it found in Nice, and two men were arrested in relation to the theft.
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#39 Rest On The Flight Into Egypt By Titian
Stolen in 1995 | Retrieved in 2002
The two-foot-wide panel painting depicting Jesus, Mary, and Joseph taking a short break on their way to Egypt was stolen from the first-floor state drawing room of Lord Bath's Longleat estate in Wiltshire in 1995. In 2002, the artwork was discovered in the Greater London area securely wrapped in a plastic carrier bag, ending the seven-year hunt for a stolen Titian masterpiece valued at more than £5 million.
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#40 The Boy In The Red Vest By Paul Cezanne
Stolen in 2008 | Retrieved in 2012
Though it took only 9 days to recover two of the four paintings stolen from a private gallery in Zürich, Switzerland, in February 2008, locating The Boy In The Red Vest took another 4 years. The painting was the last of the four retrieved and was located in Serbia in April 2012.
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