Eight years after a daring theft from a gallery in Milwaukee, a work by Pablo Picasso has been found. The print apparently hung on a wall in an apartment all that time, covered in a thick layer of dust, reports infohub.kz.
The piece is an etching titled "Torero," created by Picasso in 1949. It is done on rice paper, framed, and signed by the artist. Only 30 such prints are known to exist.
Before the theft, the print was valued at $35,000–$50,000 (16 to 23 million tenge). In 2018, the work disappeared from Bill DeLind's gallery in Milwaukee, and its whereabouts remained unknown all these years.
Last week, police asked DeLind to come and identify the recovered work. He immediately recognized it as the stolen print.
"I was stunned. I was speechless. It was an incredible moment for me," DeLind said.
Additional confirmation came from a sticker on the back of the frame. It bore the marking of DeLind Fine Art Appraisals — exactly the same as on the work before the theft.
The most unusual part of the story is where the Picasso was found. Property owner Tim Dertz discovered the print while cleaning out a vacant apartment after a tenant was evicted.
"It was hanging on the wall in a rather strange place. It seemed like it had been there for a very, very long time because there was thick dust on top," Dertz said.
He showed the find to his friend, an antique dealer. The friend recognized it as a Picasso and suggested it might be the print stolen in 2018. Dertz then handed the painting over to the police.
Now investigators must determine how the stolen work ended up in the apartment and who kept it there all these years.
Earlier, Kursiv LifeStyle reported that a painting stolen by the Nazis was found among trash in Amsterdam.