Andy Warhol piece among high-priced artworks stolen in Detroit
The FBI is looking for 19 contemporary artworks worth millions, including a “Flowers” silkscreen by Andy Warhol, stolen last month from a collector in Detroit.
The pieces were being stored temporarily at the collector’s business in the city’s historic Corktown neighborhood when they were stolen. Authorities didn’t name the owner or the business.
An FBI spokesman said the works weren’t on display -- or locked up -- and the thieves have likely taken the pieces across state lines, or the U.S. border, to try to sell them.
“So we’re putting out the message to anyone in the art community, anyone who’s shopping online and looking at art, anyone who’s involved in the pawn shop business, that these could all be avenues that someone who’s stolen this art could pursue in order to try to make a profit,” the spokesman said.
The FBI, which estimates that $6 billion worth of art is stolen each year, keeps a top 10 list of art crimes.
Some unsolved highlights include 7,000 artifacts looted from Iraqi museums in 2003, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio’s “Nativity” worth $20 million taken from an Italian oratory in 1969 and artwork taken during a 2003 break-in at Amsterdam’s Vincent Van Gogh Museum. In that case, police found the thieves, but the $30 million in stolen art is still missing.
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