Art theft

Art theft is the stealing of someone else's high-profile art. This is usually done for the purpose of resale.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Many thieves are motivated by the fact that reasonably valuable art pieces are worth millions of dollars and weigh only a few kilograms, at most. Transportation is also trivial, assuming the thief is willing to inflict some damage to the painting by cutting it off the frame and rolling it up into a tube carrier. While most high-profile museums have extremely tight security, many places hosting multimillion dollar works have disproportionaly poor security measures. That makes them susceptible to thefts that are slightly more complicated than a typical smash-and-grab, but with huge payoff. However, because the ownership of high profile art is easily tracked, potential buyers are very hard to find. Typically, a thief will steal a work, only to find out that there are no buyers. For the same reason, the stolen piece cannot be put on display publicly, which essentially defeats the purpose of having it. Unfortunately, while no thief can hope to get the actual value of the stolen work, even as little as 5% of the real value can be worthwhile for the thief. Most art is resold at auction houses; major reputable houses such as Sotheby's or Christie's demand proof of art ownership before listing. Many lost art pieces that become found and sold at auction have later been exposed as forgery or imitation.

Auction house: REDIRECT Auction...

Sotheby's: Sotheby's is a noted auction house. The first ever Sotheby's sale was held on March 11th, 1744 when the company's founder, Samuel Baker, presided over the disposal of 'several hundred scarce and valuable' books....

Christie's: Christie's is a world-famous auction house located in London. It was founded on December 5, 1766 by James Christie....

Art theft related Images and Photos (experimental)

Art	Art Expo (green)	Id Theft	Art Attack
POM Art	Tile Art 1	Art Deco Retro	Zebra Art
Pop Art is: Popeye	Art of War, The (DVD)	Sketch-Art LED Art Pad	Pop Art is: Personengruppe