(Q73727201)
Statements
US Will Return Stolen Art to Italy (English)
Sarah Cascone
25 February 2015
1 reference
The statue’s return has taken quite a bit longer, in more ways than one. The sculpture has been missing since January 7, 1964, when robbers stole it from the Museo Oliveriano in Pesaro, Italy. “The thieves that stole the statuette stole other items as well, including ivory tablets of the 9th and 13th centuries, early Christian glass artifacts from the catacombs of Rome, and Italic and Roman statuettes,” said Zabel.A Swiss dealer sold the sculpture later that decade, and it made its way to New York. Court documents indicate that collector Eugene Thaw, of E.V. Thaw & Co., bought the work “without knowledge of the theft” at some point during the 1960s or ’70s. Thaw consigned the statue with New York gallery Ward & Co. in the 1990s, but it never found a buyer. In 2012, the Italian government tracked down the piece, and began working to see it returned to the Oliveriano. (English)