The theft of artistic masterpieces has always been a source of public fascination, as the murky criminal underworld meets humankind’s highest cultural achievements. Many famous paintings have been stolen in audacious heists over the years, with some cases leading to a triumphant recovery, but other artworks are still missing to this day.
Here’s a look at the gripping stories of some of the most notorious art thefts, or paintings that have vanished in mysterious circumstances and are yet to be recovered.
The Scream, Edvard Munch (1893)
Edvard Munch’s proto-expressionist masterpiece The Scream is instantly recognizable with its bold orange sky and haunting anxiety-ridden figure. Perhaps because of the painting’s ability to connect with traumatised souls, it has been the object of several attempts of theft, two of them successful.
The first time it was stolen was in February 1994, when two men broke into the National Gallery in Oslo on the same day as the opening ceremony of the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer. The physical theft using only a ladder and some wire cutters was carried out by two hired homeless men, but the burglary was masterminded by Pal Enger.
The Norwegian Enger, who died on 29 June 2024 at the age of 57, was a gifted footballer who was good enough to play professionally, but he had a difficult childhood and instead fell into a life of crime. He began his criminal career in his teens, stealing watches and jewellery, before making his first attempt to steal The Scream in 1988.
However, Enger climbed through the wrong window of the Munch Museum in Oslo, and stole the artist’s painting Love and Pain instead. On the second attempt in 1994, his hired hands nailed the job, and Enger gave them a note to leave at the scene that read: “Thanks for the poor security”.
Enger had a devious criminal mind and enjoyed taunting the police with clues. The world-famous painting was too hot to sell on the open market, and eventually Enger resorted to a ransom attempt for its safe return. Norwegian and British police collaborated in a sting operation, and the painting was recovered mostly unharmed in May 1994.
Enger commented: “When I see the painting now it feels different, because it gets the attention it was supposed to have before I took it. They hung it in the corner before but now it’s in the middle. They built a new museum because of me.”
The next theft of The Scream occurred in 2004, when masked gunmen entered the Munch Museum in Oslo in August 2004 and stole it alongside Munch’s Madonna. The painting was recovered in August 2006, and six men were convicted of the theft.
The Wounded Table, Frida Kahlo (1940)
The Wounded Table was unveiled in Mexico City in 1940, and is a large work with echoes of Leonardo’s The Last Supper, imbued with Kahlo’s haunting surrealist imagination. She is sitting at a long table with human legs, alongside a skeleton, a figurine, and her children and pets.
According to The Times, the painting was thought to be an expression of the artist’s frustration and anger at her unfaithful and soon to be ex-husband, the artist Diego Rivera, who was more famous than Kahlo during her lifetime. After the work completed a touring exhibition, Kahlo donated it to the Soviet Union in 1943.
However, the surrealist nature of the painting clashed with Soviet principles of art, and it was never displayed in Russia. It was removed to Warsaw for an exhibition in 1955, and it has not been seen since.
The artist died a year previously to the disappearance at the age of 47 from pneumonia, although she had endured multiple surgeries and a life of chronic pain after a terrible childhood accident that left her badly maimed. As an artist, she was still relatively obscure and overshadowed by her more famous husband.
Recognition of her talents as an artist only emerged after her death, and her steadily ascending reputation in the 21st century as a pioneer of feminist art has led to renewed efforts to find the missing painting. Several fakes have been identified, and it is thought that there are thousands of Kahlo forgeries circulating.
A version of The Wounded Table emerged in 2020, with the owner represented by a Spanish art dealer who claims that the painting has been authenticated by experts and that he has a buyer willing to pay €40m. However, critics are sceptical that the painting is the original, and so the mystery continues.
Poppy Flowers, Vincent van Gogh (1887)
Vincent van Gogh’s Poppy Flowers (also known as Vase with Flowers) has been stolen twice from the Mohamed Mahmoud Khalil Museum in Cairo. The first theft occurred in 1977, and the painting was recovered ten years later in Kuwait. It was stolen again in 2010, and despite an international search and a $175,000 reward for information, it remains missing.
The painting is a small study of yellow and red poppies against a dark background, and was painted three years before the artist’s suicide. 11 Egyptian Culture Ministry employees were found guilty of negligence for the 2010 theft.
The Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci (c.1503)
Arguably the most famous painting in the world, Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was stolen from the Louvre in 1911. The theft was orchestrated by Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian handyman who believed the painting belonged in Italy. He hid in a broom closet overnight and walked out with the painting concealed under his clothes.
The masterpiece remained missing for two years before Peruggia was caught trying to sell it to an art dealer in Florence. After its recovery, the painting caught the public imagination.
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