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Stolen Renoir paintings found hidden, and damaged, behind cinder block wall

128 points ohjeez 3 days ago 81 comments

john_strinlai 19 hours ago | parent

it seems crazy to me to steal a famous painting from a museum. the number of people willing to purchase a black market painting worth ~$millions is probably like a dozen, and the transaction would be super high risk. so many easier crimes to commit.

tonyedgecombe 19 hours ago | parent

For a while members of the mafia we’re stealing them to trade against their sentence if they got caught for some other crime.

SoftTalker 18 hours ago | parent

Admit to additional crimes in exchange for a lighter sentence? How does that work?

goodcanadian 18 hours ago | parent

I doubt they admit to anything, but having some information that helps lead to the recovery of a valuable item could be worth something. To be honest, this is the first I have heard of the practice, but it sounds plausible to me.

thaumasiotes 16 hours ago | parent

There is a plotline involving this in the first season of The Line of Duty.

It opens with a guy who's complaining to the police about the frequent robbery of his house. They view him as a nuisance and try to respond to his complaints as little as possible.

Eventually someone is apprehended committing a different crime in a different location. An officer visits him in the hospital (there was a mighty struggle before he was caught) and asks if he'd be willing to lower his sentence by potentially resolving some other outstanding crimes that the police are investigating.

She reads off a list of crimes, and he responds "yeah, that was me" to everything she says. One of the items is the several robberies of the guy we met earlier.

It's win-win; his sentence is lowered for doing the police a favor, and the police report a higher solve rate.

After that, the original guy who was always brushed off suffers another robbery. Since he happens to be home at the time of the latest one, he is severely beaten.

DASD 18 hours ago | parent

Crime gravity. If able to provide the solution to a crime that is considered more serious(or of greater value to the prosecuting entity's purview).

akudha 17 hours ago | parent

So the lesson here is if you are a criminal - commit multiple crimes, hope in case you get caught then it is for a lesser crime, so you can trade secrets of a bigger crime for leniency?

I wonder what victims have gotta say about that...

dofm 16 hours ago | parent

> I wonder what victims have gotta say about that...

You only let them say anything every four years or so. And then you set aside their complaints by saying some of them are made up.

toyg 4 hours ago | parent

Not everywhere. In some countries there is no bargaining system, and criminals will just fess up because they want to unburden, or because they might as well get famous on their way down.

But it is true that most national states will have a dialogue with organised crime, and privilege the pursuit of this or that interest over blind punishment. Greater good and all that.

dh2022 18 hours ago | parent

Plea bargaining. Green river serial killer admitted to more killings (and cooperated to recover some of his victim’s bodies) in exchange for avoiding the death penalty : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Ridgway#Plea_bargain,_con...

xp84 17 hours ago | parent

"Hey, I don't have any idea how it got there, but I heard some guy talking about a famous stolen painting that's stashed right here in this neighborhood. Apparently a Renoir."

qingcharles 6 hours ago | parent

In the USA, at least, almost all criminal convictions end in a plea negotiation with the government. The criminal and the government go back and forth trying to work out a deal that is acceptable for both (shortest sentence for criminal, least work for the government). Having something the government (or a specific politian) wants can be used in your side of the negotiation.

dofm 18 hours ago | parent

Or, since it’s a Renoir, maybe they were planning to distribute them as punishment.

“Thought you were going up in the world, did you Salvo? Oh no, no Armand Guillaumin for you. The boss ain’t pleased and he wants you to know about it. One more screwup and you’ll end up with a face like that”

john_strinlai 18 hours ago | parent

i saw your other comment, and now this one. i dont really know much about art, and i'd love for you to help me understand your apparent disdain for renoir

dofm 18 hours ago | parent

https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/...

jerf 18 hours ago | parent

Ah, the classic "picture is worth a thousand words" move. Well played.

dofm 18 hours ago | parent

I could have picked a considerably worse face, too.

But this is a painting of his own young son, Jean (who went on to be a legendary director, screenwriter, actor).

So one presumes there's a method in it, because nobody hates a kid that much.

mosselman 16 hours ago | parent

Is that a phone he is holding?

dofm 16 hours ago | parent

No, it's a 13" tablet.

blitzar 2 hours ago | parent

I am a philistine when it comes to turn of the century art - but I am fairly certain that is an iPhone duo

john_strinlai 18 hours ago | parent

i did not know they did yaoi hands in 1800s france. point taken.

sherr 16 hours ago | parent

You can pick "bad" artworks from any artist, maybe even objectively bad. And I dislike many of his paintings (sickly sweet, "fluffy" style) but he also did some lovely paintings. In my opinion of course.

dofm 15 hours ago | parent

I mean, I am perpetuating a running joke.

But also yes. When he was not doing paintings with lots of faces or naked ladies he was on slightly more solid ground.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_paintings_by_Pierre-Au...

https://lastmuseum.com/artist/auguste-renoir

e.g. I like the Alfred Sisley painting and the more realist painting of his father, and Madame Clementine Valensi Stora which he apparently repudiated.

But I don't think he ever painted a truly good female nude, and some are just utterly reductive (as a photography nerd I find Torso Effect of Sunlight to be the most interesting but the face oh the face)

Loads of it is really rather Monkey Christ, on reflection, and after about 1905 nothing is great.

So I do sympathise with the joke.

pvaldes 13 hours ago | parent

Round faces and opulent bodies were hot stuff in Renoir's times, not so much today. Older people simply had different concepts of feminine beauty than us.

Also those were artists deliberately breaking the rigid rules of realist classicism and finding inspiration on Asian art. Renoir was criticized by its figures "with skin and clothes obscenely stained with what seems dirty greasy oil spots" but the big point was to trigger controversy and to flip the bird to the classicism of the "real" professional artists.

dofm 11 hours ago | parent

Whaaat? Renoir was born in 1840 and died in 1919. Women were about as slim as they are now (or slimmer) in the 1870s and generally slimmer by the early 1900s. Have a look at photographs, including artistic nudes, from this era and you will see. Anne Brigman, Alice Boughton, etc., but also any amount of late 19th century art nude and erotica; you will see that Renoir was likely deliberately choosing to paint chubbier, more cherubic, unthreatening nudes, especially after the late 1880s.

But it’s not the shapes of the bodies that I have an issue with, in general. (Apart from the whole cherubic, gravity free aspect.)

It’s the fact that the faces are terrible, featureless, ugly, often scarily unsettling and clownish, the heads are poorly proportioned, the eyes often dead or doll-like.

He painted out the realism of women just as they were demanding equality, IMO. In the real world, women were demanding better pay, better work protection and votes; in Renoir’s world they were often overgrown insipid cherubs, no evidence of angst or really any kind of inner life. His paintings of male faces, largely, are grounded in more realism even into his late era.

Cpoll 18 hours ago | parent

Renoir's kind of "pop" as far as Impressionists go. Laypeople like him because his work is easy to look at, but trained artists can find a lot to fault in his technique and composition. He was also kind of an asshole.

dennyabraham 18 hours ago | parent

The numbers are higher than you'd expect. The trade in illegal (and so high rarity and limited access) goods is ongoing and flourishing via the use of third party intermediaries like free port systems [1] as well as networks of morally grey curatorial and preservation staff. Several notable archaeological "missing links" of the past few years came from said staff mediating access to private collections of undescribed provenance.

[1] https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2015/07/01/experts-identify-...

jongjong 13 hours ago | parent

It's weird though.

I don't understand why anyone would want to buy something outside of its legal socio-economic context, when that thing's entire value is derived from that context and is otherwise worth very little intrinsically based purely on aesthetic value.

Any market value it sells for is then based on some shared mental deficiency which prevents people from understanding that.

AnimalMuppet 13 hours ago | parent

"Possession is nine-tenths of the law." That's the "legal socio-economic context". If it's worth having, and there's only one, so that if you have it nobody else does, then some people will want to have it with or without legal sanction.

And, a thing's economic value is derived from what someone else will pay for it, and only that. If someone else (or several someones) will buy it, whether or not the law agrees that it's legal, then the thing is valuable. (See drugs for an example.)

I wouldn't say that such people have a mental deficiency. A moral deficiency, yes, absolutely, but not a mental one.

embedding-shape 18 hours ago | parent

> the number of people willing to purchase a black market painting worth ~$millions is probably like a dozen

Right, but what about your local brick dealer who has 10-50K to waste on whatever? Definitely way more common and easier than you think to unload these sort of things, once you go down in price a lot because of the circumstances.

ericmay 18 hours ago | parent

There are some “criminals” and criminal gangs and such, but I think the increase we have seen is due to Russia, Iran, and others who are giving extra resources and intelligence to some of these groups to deprive western institutions of their cultural heritage as part of the “hybrid war”.

Notice how things aren’t being stolen at this magnitude in China? Japan? If we’re Russian or Iranian for example I think this would be a great strategy if you view yourself at a civilizational war. Most of Europe is still asleep or in denial.

gvfsa 18 hours ago | parent

I know posting deranged tirades about the supernatural powers of Russia is HN’s favourite pastime but this goes way too far.

xp84 17 hours ago | parent

It's supernatural now to do crime?

sitkack 16 hours ago | parent

It is supernatural to write code by hand, so yeah?

ericmay 17 hours ago | parent

What is “supernatural” about organized crime sponsored by Russia?

BonerWiener 17 hours ago | parent

> Notice how things aren’t being stolen at this magnitude in China

Stealing from a Chinese museum would be extremely difficult. Cameras and security staff monitor exhibits during the day, and even after hours, extensive surveillance everywhere, makes it hard to get away unnoticed. The risk is simply too high

ericmay 17 hours ago | parent

It’s difficult to steal from other museums too. I’m not sure I buy this argument. But let’s say it’s accurate - what about other countries?

damontal 7 hours ago | parent

There was a recent theft in a European museum. Smash and grab of jewels and coins with a hammer. They didn’t have a metal detector or any real security there.

https://www.economist.com/europe/2026/10/14/european-museums...

ericmay 6 hours ago | parent

You could make an argument some artwork is relatively less protected than its value but that at best still only explains China (per the OP). Why not other countries?

toyg 4 hours ago | parent

Formally-protected cultural heritage is disproportionately located in Europe compared to other continents, if anything because we effectively invented the practice. Italian, French, Greek, Egyptian museums store more artefacts than they can expose at any given time - we're talking 2x-3x.

ericmay 3 hours ago | parent

Sure but those are located in storage, not on display and the thefts that have occurred that I’m aware of have been on pieces in display.

I guess - is your overall point that criminals only care about European art which is why it’s stolen?

pelagicAustral 18 hours ago | parent

I would've thought thats what crypto was meant for.

slop 15 hours ago | parent

Monero or Cash.

Aurornis 18 hours ago | parent

> the number of people willing to purchase a black market painting worth ~$millions is probably like a dozen

You only need one.

With something like this I imagine you could hold on to it for years or even a lifetime waiting for the right connection to come along. Maybe some of them are even commissioned or pre-sold.

I can’t say I know anyone with stolen art, but over my lifetime I’ve known people across a range of wealth classes who got a thrill out of acquiring and owning something that was risky contraband.

tough 17 hours ago | parent

One would think most jobs are "by order" and thus the customer comes before the risk

jimnotgym 16 hours ago | parent

If you can wait out the statute of limitations you can of course sell it. It seems that in France that is not a thing in stolen art from a public collection

timcobb 16 hours ago | parent

You can't sell stolen art by waiting out the statute of limitations

autoexec 15 hours ago | parent

Even if you could no longer be charged with the theft itself, the act of selling stolen property would be a fresh new crime.

ASalazarMX 11 hours ago | parent

Sell it as soon as you can, then wait for the prescription, got it.

fnord77 3 hours ago | parent

charge admission to view it

qingcharles 6 hours ago | parent

I know someone in LA with a piece like this. I was invited with a couple of close friends to their house to view it. This person didn't buy it, though, they took it with their own hands (and explained how simple it was). There were four of these pieces made. I'm pretty certain one is on public display. I don't know about the other two.

I always wondered if these sorts of people actually existed, with a Mona Lisa tucked away in a secret room, or something. And it turns out, yes, they really do.

fortran77 5 hours ago | parent

> I can’t say I know anyone with stolen art,

You don’t know anyone who downloaded a movie?

YVoyiatzis 17 hours ago | parent

Unless you’re keeping it for yourself…

qingcharles 6 hours ago | parent

The one person I know who did this kept it for themselves.

sandworm101 17 hours ago | parent

There is specific Italian law about return of art. This would normally apply to people who stole the art but a careful lawyer could use this law to negotiate a reduced punishment for organized crime charges. If the art theft is described as a part of a larger criminal enterprise, then the return of that art could trigger a 2/3 reduction in punishment. See below (translated by google).

https://documenti.camera.it/leg18/dossier/testi/gi0031b.htm

"is committed by the person who has collaborated in identifying the co-conspirators or has ensured evidence of the crime or has effectively worked to prevent the criminal activity from being carried to further consequences or has recovered or had recovered the cultural property subject to the crime (penalty reduced from one third to two thirds)."

dewey 16 hours ago | parent

From the documentaries I've watched it's usually the other way around. There's either already a known buyer, or the thief has someone in their circles that already knows how to sell it. So there's a middleman between already trusted entities.

slop 15 hours ago | parent

And then if you offer to sell it to someone, they could blackmail you unless you give it to them for free or cheaper.

gwbas1c 14 hours ago | parent

A month or two I listened to a podcast about stolen art. To summarize:

1: The stolen art sits around for a LONG TIME.

2: The provenance (papers) is forged

3: The buyer usually doesn't look too closely. They're either willing to fool themselves, gullible, or otherwise should know better.

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-case-of-the-4-million-g...

john_strinlai 12 hours ago | parent

appreciate the link, thanks, ill be giving that a listen for sure

dofm 19 hours ago | parent

You mean they didn’t brick it back up when they discovered it was a Renoir?

Missed opportunity IMO. It was where it belongs.

You know how Anthropic has banned being cruel to its models? I wonder if the definition includes asking it to generate images in the style of Renoir…

https://www.instagram.com/renoir_sucks_at_painting/

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/art-bites-renoir-sucks-mov...

(ETA: Flagged, haha really? Come on. It’s a well-known running joke.)

ericmay 18 hours ago | parent

What are you talking about? Those are some of the best paintings ever created. Anyone trying to tell you different is probably a fascist or communist. Both authoritarian and hate-filled ideologies that have no place in modern or future societies.

dofm 18 hours ago | parent

Fascists, communists, art critics, and people who can actually paint women’s faces.

(It’s a joke. Like Birds Aren’t Real)

ericmay 18 hours ago | parent

I see - sorry I couldn’t tell. There are a lot of lunatics out there.

matkoniecz 17 hours ago | parent

> Anyone trying to tell you different is probably a fascist or communist.

are you serious and it is your actual position or is it also a joke?

ericmay 17 hours ago | parent

It’s an actual position. These kinds of ideologies hate “the good life” and consider such paintings either decadent (fascists) or supportive of the bourgeoisie (communists).

ks2048 17 hours ago | parent

Random fact: one of the socialist leaders of the Paris Commune saved Renoir's life.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoul_Rigault

ericmay 17 hours ago | parent

Hitler probably helped an old lady cross the street once too. Terrible people or those supporting authoritarian ideologies can still do nice things. They pet dogs and eat ice cream too.

vixen99 3 hours ago | parent

A fantasy on my part of course but wouldn't it be instructive for folk to have to present their arguments as why they decide to downvote a comment?

ericmay 1 hour ago | parent

Eh who cares. I view it this way: downvotes mean I’m right, up-votes mean people agree with me. :)

SantalBlush 13 hours ago | parent

I had no idea this was a thing, but I made a similar joke about Renoir last month when the paintings were stolen, so I guess I belong in this club.

Insimwytim 18 hours ago | parent

for a split second branch prediction in my head replaced 'cinder block wall' in the title with 'paywall'

jacquesm 16 hours ago | parent

As long as you are eventually consistent it is all good.

blobdole 17 hours ago | parent

"It was through interrogation work that investigators were able to get the receiver of the stolen goods to admit that he had indeed taken possession of the paintings."

Humans are always the hole in the security you build, no matter how good the wall is.

glouwbug 17 hours ago | parent

Interrogation is great, you can even get people to confess to things they didn't even do (from IASIP or something like that)

dmix 7 hours ago | parent

It was an "organized gang" who already had a police tracking GPS on their vehicle from another criminal investigation

> In addition to DNA, the investigators were also able to benefit from a happy combination of circumstances since “the burglars, after abandoning in the hinterland, near the ski resort of Gréolières, the stolen vehicle that was used for the breakage, took back theirs which was, possibly in the context of another case, equipped with a police beacon,” the lawyer told AFP. The police were thus able to track the car.

https://www.leparisien.fr/faits-divers/le-principal-suspect-...

moffkalast 17 hours ago | parent

I though this was about The Swedish Job, but apparently this is a completely new Renoir theft? Did they not learn anything from the first one?

mosselman 16 hours ago | parent

The thieves probably just wanted to buy a new gaming PC and thus had to resort to stealing 10 million worth of paintings.

I guess they were going to share the one PC.

ChuckMcM 5 hours ago | parent

The story was kind of wild. I have never understood art theft as its very hard to move it. Now if they had made really good forgeries, then swapped them in the original museum frames and hid those to be "found", well that then would be a NY Times best seller.

dylan604 5 hours ago | parent

Stuff like that tends to have a buyer before it is actually stolen.

INTPenis 4 hours ago | parent

I also think so, but that makes you question the buyer.

Who are these people that want priceless art they can't show anyone?

Remember when Kim Kardashian accidentally took a picture of herself next to some stolen statue? So it was uncovered because of her negligence.

It sort of hints that there's this class of ultra rich people who move in their own stratosphere and look at each other's possibly stolen art without snitching each other out.