Two Ancient Statues Stolen in the 1980s From Italian Museums are Now Home
ROME (AP),- Two ancient statues stolen in the 1980s from Italian museums are now back home, thanks in part to a police art squad expert who spotted one of them in a New York gallery while window-shopping on vacation in the United States.
The bronze statue of the Greek god Zeus and a marble female torso, both dating from the 1st century, had ended up in the hands of a dealer and a collector in New York, officials told a news conference Friday in Rome.
The torso, from a small museum in Terracina, south of Rome, was on display in a Madison Ave. art gallery when Michele Speranza, a member of the Italian Carabinieri art squad that hunts down stolen artifacts, strolled by when on holiday last year.
- Italian Carabinieri marshal Michele Speranza stands next to a marble female torso, dated from the end of the 1st century, is on display during a press conferencein Rome, Friday, Nov. 19, 2010. The female torso, along with a bronze statue also dated from the 1st century, was stolen from Italian museums in the 1980s, and returned to Italy after being found in the hands of a dealer and a collector in New York. No arrests have been made in either theft. Authorities said those who owned them were unaware of their provenance. U.S. customs and immigration officials aided in the investigation. AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito
“I stopped to look at the gallery window and I recognized the statue,” Speranza, 38, told reporters. “I thought I had seen it among the photos in our databank” of missing art, said the officer, who took a photo of the work with his cell phone and did some research when he returned to his job in Rome.
“The statue had been given up for lost” after it being stolen in 1988, said Gen. Pasquale Muggeo, head of the Carabinieri art division renowned for tracking down art treasures and artifacts stolen or illegally excavated from Italian soil.
The bronze and the torso are each valued at euro500,000 ($680,000), authorities said.
The Zeus was stolen from the National Museum in Rome near the capital’s main train station in 1980, and was tracked to a New York collector after a photo of it appeared in a Sotheby’s auction catalog in 2006. The art squad methodically studies catalogues of major auction houses.
No arrests have been made in either theft. Authorities said those who owned the statues were unaware of their illegal provenance.
Related posts:
- Versace’s Return Painting Stolen from a London Home in 1979 to Original Owners
- Archaeologists in Egypt Unearth Twelve More Sphinx Statues Along the Ancient Avenue
- Italian cops nab alleged vandal of famous fountain; “exemplary punishment” requested by Mayor
- Greece: Authorities say Couple who had Peter Paul Rubens stolen work were ‘amateurs’
- Stolen Painting Believed to Be a Modigliani Held Clue to Serbia War Crimes Arrest
