Trump star vandal arrested for Marilyn statue theft in Hollywood

The "Ladies of Hollywood Gazebo" is seen on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California, June 18, 2019. Robyn Beck / AFP.

LOS ANGELES (AFP).- A man convicted of vandalizing President Donald Trump's sidewalk star in Hollywood last summer has been arrested for stealing a statue of Marilyn Monroe from a nearby monument.

Austin Clay, 25, was identified by police from video surveillance footage. Having discovered that he was on parole after a conviction for damaging Trump's star on the famous Hollywood "Walk of Fame," investigators searched his home Friday. According to local media reports, they found evidence linking him to the theft of the statue.

The statue itself -- showing Monroe in her famous flying skirt pose from "The Seven Year Itch" (1955) -- has not been found.

It had been perched atop a small gazebo at the beginning of the "Walk of Fame", part of a monument dedicated to Hollywood's most famous actresses. According to authorities, a witness saw a man climbing the structure on the night of June 16 and using a saw to remove the statue.

Police fear the statue may have been damaged during the theft. "Looking back at the (security) video, it would be reasonable that the statue broke and could be in multiple pieces," LAPD detective Douglas Oldfield told NBC4 television. The suspect was arrested and detained over the weekend.

Clay made headlines in July 2018 when he vandalized Trump's star on the Hollywood sidewalk with a pickaxe he had hidden in a guitar case. He was sentenced at the time to one day in prison, three years' probation and 20 days of community service, and ordered to attend psychological counselling.

© Agence France-Presse
http://artdaily.com/news/114668/Trump-star-vandal-arrested-for-Marilyn-statue-theft-in-Hollywood#.XRJYQehKiUk

London gallery chief quits after Israel spyware report

In this file photo taken on November 4, 2018, Hans Ulrich Obrist (L) and Yana Peel attend the 2019 Breakthrough Prize at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. The head of London's Serpentine Galleries, Yana Peel, resigned on June 18, 2019 following a newspaper report about her links to a controversial Israeli spyware firm. Miikka Skaffari / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / AFP.

LONDON (AFP).- The head of London's Serpentine Galleries, Yana Peel, resigned on Tuesday following a newspaper report about her links to a controversial Israeli spyware firm.

The board of trustees of the contemporary art galleries announced "with a mix of gratitude and regret" that it has accepted Peel's resignation, adding that she would be "sorely missed". In a separate statement carried by The Guardian newspaper, Peel referenced a "concerted lobbying campaign against my husband's recent investment".

The Guardian reported last week that Yana Peel co-owns NSO Group, a spyware company based in the Israeli seaside high-tech hub of Herzliya, near Tel Aviv. It has faced questions over its Pegasus software, which can reportedly switch on a target's cell phone camera and microphone, and access data on it, effectively turning the phone into a pocket spy. Security researchers believe it was used in an attack on the WhatsApp messaging app in May.

The company has also been forced to deny it was used against Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi before he was killed last October in Istanbul. "The work of the Serpentine -- and its incomparable artistic director -- cannot be allowed to be undermined by misguided personal attacks on me and my family," Peel said, according to the statement. "These attacks are based upon inaccurate media reports now subject to legal complaints."

Peel said she was saddened to leave the role, which she started in 2016, adding: "The world of art is about free expression. "But it is not about bullying and intimidation. I welcome debate and discussion about the realities of life in the digital age.

"There is a place for these debates, but they should be constructive, fair and factual -- not based upon toxic personal attacks."

© Agence France-Presse

http://artdaily.com/news/114503/London-gallery-chief-quits-after-Israel-spyware-report#.XRJWGOhKiUk

Art-World Scammer Anna Delvey Has Been Sentenced to Four to Twelve Years in Prison

The sentence comes after a dramatic, 22-day trial, during which she was found guilty on nearly all counts.

Fake German heiress Anna Sorokin is led away after being sentenced in Manhattan Supreme Court May 9, 2019. Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP.

Anna “Delvey” Sorokin—the woman found guilty late last month of orchestrating a complex scheme to defraud a group of friends and investors, whom she told she was a German heiress about to inherit €60 million—was sentenced this afternoon to four to 12 years in prison by the New York State Supreme Court. This includes 561 days already served on Riker’s Island.

Sorokin faced a maximum of 15 years in jail, and according to some reports, could have gotten off with as little as one year if she had accepted a plea deal months ago. She was also ordered this afternoon to pay $198,956 in restitution and $24,000 in fines.

Judge Diane Kiesel, noting that Sorokin exhibited no signs of remorse throughout the trial, said she was “stunned at the extent of the defendant’s deception. Even when it came crashing down on her like a house of cards, she was running from one luxury hotel to another, one step ahead of the law.”

Noting that Sorokin’s attorney, Todd Spodek, opened his arguments with a reference to Frank Sinatra’s song “New York, New York,” Judge Kiesel said: “I heard a different song in over 22 days of trial. It was more like ‘Blinded by the Light.'”

Judge Kiesel said the purported arts club that Sorokin told everyone she was creating on Park Avenue actually sounded like it was a good addition to New York City had it been true. But instead of the serious work involved in creating such a legitimate project, Sorokin was caught up in a “big scam” with her efforts focused solely on designer clothes, exotic travel, and staying in boutique hotels.

Assistant district attorney Catherine McCaw also emphasized Sorokin’s lack of remorse and vanity. “She repeatedly delayed proceedings because she was unhappy with the clothing on offer,” McCaw said, adding: “during victims’ testimony, she laughed as if she was reliving fond memories.” Sorokin “didn’t want an ordinary life, and was willing to steal” in order to get the life she desired, McCaw added.

Before the sentencing, Sorokin was asked if she had any comments. “I apologize for my mistakes,” she said.

Following the sentencing, Spodek said his client was “holding up okay. She’s a tough woman and a strong woman. She’s been incarcerated for almost two years at Riker’s Island,” and will be moved to a prison upstate at some point, he said.

After a dramatic trial, Sorokin was found guilty in late April on nearly all the charges filed against her. She was convicted on a total of eight counts, including grand larceny in the first, second, and third degrees, and theft of services. Jurors found her not guilty on two other charges: allegedly stealing $60,000 from a friend who paid for a luxurious trip for four to Morocco; and a second count of attempted grand larceny, related to her effort to secure a $22 million bank loan.

The trial presented testimony from dozens of witnesses, including bankers, architects, law enforcement officials, hotel security personnel, and former friends. She told them all the same story: that she stood to inherit a trust fund worth €60 million on her 25th birthday.

A focal point of Delvey’s grand plans involving pitching herself as the developer of a lavish luxury arts club. In a detailed, 80-page brochure aimed at potential investors in the “Anna Delvey Foundation,” revealed as part of the trial, Delvey boasted of being a lifelong art collector. Witnesses at the trial outlined her efforts to secure loans of upwards of $20 million for the purported arts club in a massive building on Park Avenue South that is now occupied by Swedish photography institution Fotografiska.

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/anna-delvey-sorokin-sentenced-1541524?utm_content=from_&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=US%20News%20Afternoon%204%3A30%20p.m.%20for%205%2F9%2F19&utm_term=NEW%20US%20NEWSLETTER%20LIST%20%2890%20D AY%20ENGAGED%20ONLY%29
Eileen Kinsella, May 9, 2019
Senior Market Editor for artnet

Stolen Picasso Painting Is Recovered in Amsterdam, Investigator Says

The Dutch art detective Arthur Brand posing with Pablo Picasso’s “Portrait of Dora Maar” this month in his home in Amsterdam. Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

By Nina Siegal
March 26, 2019

AMSTERDAM — An art crimes investigator in the Netherlands said Tuesday that he had recovered Pablo Picasso’s 1938 painting “Portrait of Dora Maar,” which was stolen from the yacht of its Saudi Arabian owner in the south of France in 1999. Arthur Brand, an independent art detective based in Amsterdam, handed the painting over to an insurance company two weeks ago, he said. Mr. Brand had been trying to track down the Picasso painting since 2015, but all of his leads went nowhere.

Earlier this month, he said, he was contacted by “two persons with good contacts in the underworld,” who said the painting was in the Netherlands. “They told me, ‘It’s in the hands of a businessman who got it as payment, and he doesn’t know what to do with it,’” Mr. Brand said in an interview. “I talked to the two guys and we made a plan to get it out of his hands.”

The two contacts, whom Mr. Brand declined to name, dropped the painting off at Mr. Brand’s house in Amsterdam in two plastic garbage bags, he said. “They delivered it right to my door,” he said. Mr. Brand said they drank a toast to the painting and, after that, he hung the Picasso on his wall. “The urge was too great; I couldn’t resist,” he said. The next day, a Picasso specialist from the Pace Gallery in New York flew to the Netherlands to check the painting, and verified its authenticity, Mr. Brand said. (A spokesman for Pace declined to comment.)

Mr. Brand turned the painting over to a retired British detective, Dick Ellis, the founder of Scotland Yard’s art and antiquities squad, who is now a representative for an insurance company that Mr. Brand declined to name. Mr. Ellis, who did not respond to requests for comment, told Agence France-Presse, “There is no doubt that this is the stolen Picasso.”

The subject of Picasso’s portrait, Dora Maar, was a French photographer, painter, poet and one of the artist’s lovers. He portrayed her in many paintings and drawings. This one, painted in 1938, was apparently one of his favorites, which he kept in his private collection until he died. Mr. Brand said that was part of the reason that it had been difficult to recover. “It was never published, there were almost no pictures of it, and it had never been in a museum,” he said. “Picasso is one of the most stolen artists.”

The owner in 1999 was a Saudi Arabian billionaire, Sheikh Abdul Mohsen, who had it on his luxury yacht at Antibes, France, when it was stolen. Mr. Brand said it probably came into the Netherlands as “payment for drugs or for arms deals.”

Mr. Brand said that he will probably receive no payment for recovering the artwork. “At the time there was a reward offered of 400,000 euros and I don’t know if the reward will be paid,” he said. “If there is a reward, it should go to the people who brought it in. My reward was to have a Picasso on my wall for one night. I can tell you, it was great.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/arts/design/stolen-picasso-dora-maar-amsterdam.html

Thieves Stole a $3.4 Million Brueghel From a Remote Italian Church—or So They Thought. Here’s How the Village Tricked Them

The town's mayor was one of the few people who knew that the real painting was somewhere safe but locals had their suspicions something was up. Nan Stewert, March 13, 2019

The Crucifixion by Pieter Brueghel the Younger was lifted from a church in northern Italy on Wednesday. The Crucifixion by Pieter Brueghel the Younger that thieves tried to lift from a church in northern Italy on Wednesday. An audacious group of robbers made off with a prized 17th-century painting by Flemish painter Pieter Brueghel the Younger from a Church in Northern Italy on Wednesday—or so they thought.

After a tip-off, Italian police covertly switched the Crucifixion for a copy in the church of Santa Maria Maddalena in Castelnuovo Magra, about an hour and a half’s drive from Genoa. The mayor of the small town of around 8,500 residents was in on the secret and a few vigilant members of the congregation, who noticed the picture looked out of place, are reported to have kept silent.

Using a hammer to break the case, the thieves lifted the worthless copy picture and made off in Peugeot car. Police believe two people were involved in the attempted heist. The town’s mayor, Daniele Montebello, originally stuck to the story that the real painting had been stolen but on Wednesday he revealed that after rumors began circulating that someone could steal the work, the police decided to put it in a safe place, replacing it with a copy and installing some cameras. Montebello told the Guardian: “I thank the police but also some of the churchgoers, who noticed that the painting on display wasn’t the original but kept up the secret.”

Among other artworks housed in the church are sculptures fashioned from Carrara marble, a material made famous by Michelangelo. The targeted painting, which shows the Crucifixion from above, is similar in composition to another work by Brueghel (1564–1636) that belongs to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. That picture, which is thought to be from around 1617, may be based on a work done by the artist’s father, Pieter Brueghel the Elder (1525–1569).

The younger Brueghel’s auction record stands at $10.7 million, set at Christie’s in 2011 for The Battle Between Carnival and Lent. According to the Guardian, art crime has fallen in Italy from a reported 906 incidents in 2011 to 449 in 2016. But the country remains a popular destination for thieves because of its rich cultural heritage and plethora of churches filled with art that remain open free and open to the public.

UPDATE, March 14: This story has been updated to include new details that emerged about the police replacing the original work with a copy.

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Algeria museum vandalised during protests: ministry

ALGIERS- The National Museum of Antiquities and Islamic Arts was vandalized Friday by a group of offenders who stole a number of valuables objects after having burned the administrative premises, which led to the destruction of documents and records, the Ministry of Culture said.http://www.aps.dz/en/algeria/28276-national-museum-of-antiquities-and-islamic-arts-vandalized

ALGIERS (AFP).- Algeria's oldest museum, home to some of the country's most valuable art, was vandalised during protests against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term, the culture ministry said Saturday. "Criminals" took advantage of thousands-strong demonstrations on Friday to break into the National Museum of Antiquities and Islamic Arts in Algiers, founded in 1897, the ministry said in a statement. "Part of the museum was ransacked, objects stolen and administrative offices burned, as well as documents and records being destroyed," the ministry said.

Firefighters arrived promptly and prevented the blaze from spreading, while police had managed to retrieve a sabre dating from the time of the Algerian resistance to the French conquest of Algeria in the early 19th century, it said. Tens of thousands protested across Algeria on Friday in the biggest rallies yet against ailing Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term in April polls. The police fired tear gas and stun grenades to disperse those who tried to force their way through a police cordon, but most demonstrators dispersed calmly as darkness fell.

The ministry called the acts at the museum "a crime against a historical heritage that covers several important stages of Algerian popular history". Founded during the French occupation of Algeria, which lasted from 1830 to 1962, the museum is one of the oldest in Africa and covers over 2,500 years of history and art.

Police had not yet identified those responsible, the ministry said, adding that security had been reinforced Saturday and that "criminals" had already attempted to enter the site during a previous protest on March 1. The museum lies at a major crossroads close to the presidential palace in Algiers. The junction was the scene of clashes Friday between young protesters and police, while demonstrations elsewhere in the city passed off in relative calm.

© Agence France-Presse

http://artdaily.com/news/111915/Algeria-museum-vandalised-during-protests--ministry#.XIZ-syhKiUk

New York museum says ancient coffin was looted, will go back to Egypt

Gilded Coffin Lid for the Priest Nedjemankh (detail) Late Ptolemaic Period (150–50 B.C.) Cartonnage, gold, silver, resin, glass, wood The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Purchase, 2017 Benefit Fund; Lila Acheson Wallace Gift; Louis V. Bell, Harris Brisbane Dick, Fletcher, and Rogers Funds and Joseph Pulitzer Bequest; Leona Sobel Education and The Camille M. Lownds Funds; and 2016 Benefit Fund, 2017 (2017.255b) Image: © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

NEW YORK (AFP).- The Metropolitan Museum of Art will return an ancient gilded coffin to Egypt after New York prosecutors determined that it had been looted from that country, the museum said. The museum had purchased the prized coffin, dating from the first century BCE, in July 2017 from a Paris art dealer for a price of nearly four million dollars. But the Manhattan district attorney's office determined that the mummy-shaped golden coffin had been sold with fake documentation, including a forged 1971 Egyptian export license.

It was not clear what had sparked the district attorney's investigation. The statement Friday quoted Met CEO Daniel Weiss as apologizing to the Egyptian people and specifically to Antiquities Minister Khaled El-Enany. "After we learned that the Museum was a victim of fraud and unwittingly participated in the illegal trade of antiquities, we worked with the DA's office for its return to Egypt," Weiss said.

The museum said it would "consider all available remedies to recoup the purchase price of the coffin" and would commit itself "to identifying how justice can be served, and how we can help to deter future offenses against cultural property." The museum vowed to "review and revise its acquisitions process."

The elaborately decorated coffin, viewed by nearly a half-million visitors since it was made the centerpiece of a major exhibition in July, is sheathed in gold, which the ancient Egyptians associated with the gods. It is inscribed with the name of Nedjemankh, a high-ranking priest of the ram-headed god Heryshef of Herakleopolis. The Met took the coffin off view this week to deliver it to the district attorney's office for its eventual return to Egypt.

© Agence France-Presse
http://artdaily.com/news/111395/New-York-museum-says-ancient-coffin-was-looted--will-go-back-to-Egypt#.XHBG4OhKiUk