Conference turris::scandia

The Munch Museum is an astonishing experience.  Hundreds of paintings with mostly
depressing subjects and brilliantly bright colors all by the same artist.

    From: [email protected] (Reuter/Alister Doyle)
    Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.western,clari.news.law.crime,clari.news.arts
    Subject: Norwegians in Secret Talks over Munch Picture
    Date: Tue, 29 Mar 94 3:40:11 PST
 
	 OSLO (Reuter) - A group of Norwegian investors is secretly
discussing paying a ransom for one of the world's most famous
paintings, "The Scream," which was stolen from an Oslo gallery
last month, an official said Tuesday.
	 "We've been informed of these latest efforts to get the
picture back," said Sigurd Sandvin, a political advisor to
Culture Minister Aase Kleveland.
	 The Norwegian daily Dagbladet said an anonymous group had
been negotiating with thieves' representatives over a $680,000
ransom for the 1893 Norwegian work, which would then be donated
to the National Gallery.
	 "The Scream," painted by Edvard Munch, showing a waif-like
figure wide-mouthed in terror beneath a blood-red sky, was
stolen from the gallery by two thieves February 12.
	 Sandvin confirmed a Dagbladet report that Jens Kristian
Thune, chairman of the gallery's board, had informed the
ministry that investors were involved in talks on a ransom.
	 Thune said the ministry had not given any signals it was
morally opposed to the idea of a ransom to recover the work.
	 "For the National Gallery the most important thing is that
Munch's painting is returned. How and eventually who will pay is
not so important for the gallery," Thune told Dagbladet.
	 Sandvin said that neither the ministry nor the National
Gallery were involved in the negotiations and were awaiting news
while police tried to catch the thieves.
	 Dagbladet said the investors were rich people who had built
up their own firms. At least one apparently wanted to use any
successful recovery of "The Scream" to help market his
company.
	 The National Gallery tightened security after the theft.
	 As one thief steadied a ladder outside, another climbed up,
smashed a window, clambered in, cut the painting from its wire
hanging and whisked it away as alarm bells rang. The theft took
less than a minute.
	 Last month, the gallery backed out of talks on paying a
$1.09 million ransom after the person claiming to represent the
thieves refused to bring a photograph of the painting as proof
they had it.
	 "The Scream" has become an icon of angst in a 20th century
overshadowed by two World Wars, the Holocaust, the nuclear bomb
and continuing horrors such as the war in former Yugoslavia.
	 Norway has offered a reward of $27,000 for information
leading to the return of the work, 35.8 inches by 28.9. The
gallery believes it could not be sold on the open market.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [email protected] (AP)
Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.western,clari.news.arts
Subject: Talks Under Way On `Scream'
Date: Tue, 29 Mar 94 14:10:32 PST
 
	OSLO, Norway (AP) -- Wealthy businessmen are negotiating with art
thieves to buy back Norway's most famous painting, ``The Scream,''
a government official confirmed Tuesday.
        The painting shows a figure on a bridge, screaming for no discernible
reason.
	The Oslo newspaper Dagbladet reported Tuesday that the anonymous
businessmen were negotiating through a middleman with people who
claim to have the painting.
	The newspaper said they were willing to pay the equivalent of
$675,000 to return it to the museum.
	Jens Kristian Thune, the chairman of the museum board, told the
newspaper that he had been contacted by people representing a group
of private investors.
	"They have said they are willing to buy back the painting,"
Thune told Dagbladet. "I have been in contact with both the
national museum management and the Ministry of Culture and they
have been informed about the situation. I haven't received any
signal that would make such a solution difficult."
	Museum officials refused to comment, and Thune was not
immediately available. Police said they had no information about
the talks.
	On March 3, the government received a ransom demand for $1
million for the painting. Norwegian attorney Tor Erling Staff said
he was relaying the offer from a middleman who claimed he could
arrange the return of the painting.
	The museum could not afford the ransom and the would-be ransomers
would not prove they had the painting.
	During the 50-second robbery, which was filmed by a security
camera, two thieves climbed up a ladder, broke a window at the
museum, and stole the painting. Police have said they have few
clues.

    From: [email protected] (AP)
    Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.western,clari.news.law.crime
    Subject: Sweden Jails Picasso Theives
    Date: Fri, 8 Apr 94 8:20:16 PDT
 
	STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) -- Two Swedish men and a Pole were
sentenced to prison Friday for Sweden's biggest art robbery - the
theft of $52 million in Pablo Picasso and Georges Bracque works
from Stockholm's Modern Art Museum.
	The prosecutor had sought six-year terms and fines totaling $40
million ($32 million) to cover the estimated value of four missing
paintings and a bronze sculpture.
	The total take in the robbery was estimated at 415 million
kronor ($52 million), one of the world's biggest art thefts.
	Three Picasso paintings, stolen last Nov. 7 when the thieves
sawed a hole in the museum's roof, were recovered last December in
the attic of an apartment building where one of the defendants
lived.
	That man, Erwin Marczak, 23, was sentenced to a year and a half
in prison for receiving stolen goods and being an accomplice to
grand theft.
	His brother, Krystian Marczak, a 24-year-old Polish citizen, was
sentenced to four years in prison for participating in the robbery.
Kenneth Vikstrom, a 23-year-old Swede, was sentenced to four and a
half years for theft.
	Police are still seeking a fourth man, Roine Fogelmark, 43, on
an international arrest warrant. Investigators believe the missing
paintings and Picasso sculpture may have been taken out of the
country.

  From: [email protected] (Reuter/Alister Doyle)
  Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.northern,clari.news.crime.misc,
	clari.news.law.crime,clari.living.arts,clari.news.arts,
	clari.world.europe.western
  Subject: Part of Frame of "The Scream" Found in Norway
  Date: Wed, 27 Apr 94 2:50:09 PDT
 
	 OSLO (Reuter) - Part of the frame of the stolen Norwegian
masterpiece "The Scream" has been found in what could be a
cryptic sign the thieves want talks on returning the work, the
National Gallery said Wednesday.
	 But the bizarre find of the 37-inch piece of gilt-covered
wood at an abandoned bus stop outside Oslo also stirred fears
that the 1893 painting by Norway's Edvard Munch, one of the
best-known in the world, may have been damaged.
	 "It's extremely difficult to evaluate the importance of the
find. But it must have been planted there... It indicates that
they are trying to establish contact," Knut Berg, director of
the National Gallery, told Reuters.
	 "The Scream," showing a waif-like figure wide-mouthed in
terror beneath a blood-red sky, was stolen from the National
Gallery on February 12, the day of the opening of the
Lillehammer Olympics.
	 "It's a fragile painting. Rumors that it had been taken out
of the frame have now been confirmed. That makes us awfully
nervous," Berg said.
	 The work, 35.8 inches by 28.9 inches wide, is waxed crayon
and tempera on cardboard. Berg said it could easily be smudged
outside its frame and cover of armored glass.
	 "The Scream" has been used as the anguished symbol of a
century scarred by two World Wars, the Holocaust, the atom bomb
and modern horrors such as the conflict in Bosnia.
	 The piece of the frame was recovered Tuesday after a tip to
the Norwegian daily Dagbladet, which declined to identify the
tipster.
	 Officials have said a group of Norwegian investors has been
involved in furtive talks about paying a possible ransom for the
work, aiming then to donate it to the National Gallery.
	 "But there are so many rumors and so many people on the
fringes of the criminal world who say they have information
without giving us or the police any solid leads," Berg said.
	 Police were examining the recovered piece of the frame
Wednesday for fingerprints or other clues.
	 "It's not yet possible to say if this find will help the
investigation," police Inspector Leif Lier, heading the hunt
for the thieves, told Reuters.
	 Chief restorer Leif Einar Plather at the National Gallery
said the frame had been taken apart carefully, without wrecking
the wood.
	 "But it's impossible to say anything about the state of the
painting from that except that it's now unprotected and that
worries us," he said.

  From: [email protected] (Reuters)
  Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.northern,clari.living.arts,clari.news.arts,
	clari.news.crime.misc,clari.news.law.crime,clari.world.europe.western
  Subject: Police Arrest Man in Sweden's Biggest Art Robbery
  Date: Fri, 6 May 94 7:40:17 PDT
 
	 STOCKHOLM (Reuter) - A 43-year-old man was arrested Friday
  on suspicion of taking part in Sweden's biggest art robbery --
  the theft of five Picasso paintings, a Picasso sculpture and two
  works by French cubist Georges Braque.
	 A spokeswoman for the Stockholm district court said Roine
  Fagelmark had been arrested after being found Thursday at a
  pizzeria just outside of Stockholm. He had been detained for one
  day in December but then released on lack of evidence.
	 "I think the 43-year-old can show us where the paintings
  are," chief district prosecutor Sven-Erik Alhem said.
	 Only three works, all lesser-known Picassos, have been
  recovered since the theft from Stockholm's Modern Museum last
  November in which works of art valued together at $60 million
  were stolen. Thieves sawed a hole in the museum roof and lowered
  themselves into the building.
	 Three men were jailed last month for the robbery but have
appealed the sentence and will go on trial again in June.

  From: [email protected] (Reuter/Stella Bugge)
  Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.northern,clari.world.top
  Subject: Munch's Masterpiece "the Scream" Found Undamaged
  Date: Sat, 7 May 94 13:10:21 PDT
 
	 OSLO, Norway (Reuter) - The Norweigan masterpiece "The
Scream" was recovered undamaged Saturday three months after it
was stolen from the National Gallery, and three people were
arrested in connection with the robbery, police said.
	 Edvard Munch's priceless 1893 painting was found at a hotel
in southern Norway near where the artist often painted. It was
taken from the National Gallery in Oslo February 12, the day of
the opening of the Winter Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway.
	 "The painting was found today at Aasgaardstrand hotel and
three people have been charged with assisting in handling stolen
goods," police inspector Leif Lier told Reuters.
	 Munch had a summer cottage in Aasgaardstrand, a beach
resort, and painted many of his most famous works there.
	 Lier declined to comment on whether a ransom had been paid
for the painting of a waif-like figure, wide-mouthed in terror
beneath a blood-red sky.
	 He said the work, which had been removed from its frame, was
undamaged. Two pieces of the frame were found after the theft,
one by two boys by a roadside near Oslo last week.
	 Lier said Norwegian police had been helped by Britain's
Scotland Yard but declined to give further details.
	 Art experts said the painting is impossible to sell on the
open market and a group of Norwegian investors has allegedly
been involved in talks about paying a ransom for the work,
aiming to return it to the National Gallery.
	 "The Scream," 35.8 inches by 28.9 inches, has been used as
the anguished symbol of a century scarred by two World Wars, the
Holocaust, the atom bomb and modern horrors such as the conflict
in Bosnia.
	 It was stolen on the opening day of the Winter Olympics in
February by two men, filmed by video surveillance, who climbed
into the gallery up a ladder. They smashed a window, grabbed the
painting and disappeared in less than a minute.
	 Several Munch paintings have been stolen in the past. The
well-known "Vampire" was taken in 1988 and a lithograph named
"Madonna" disappeared in 1990. Both were later recovered.
	 A portrait study for the painting "Sick Girl," stolen last
year, has not been found.
	 The artist lived from 1863 to 1944.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  From: [email protected] (Reuter/Stella Bugge)
  Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.northern,clari.world.top
  Subject: One Suspect Released after "the Scream" Recovery
  Date: Sun, 8 May 94 13:40:07 PDT
 
	 OSLO, Norway (Reuter) - Norwegian police said Sunday they
had released one of three people arrested when Edvard Munch's
stolen masterpiece "The Scream" was found over the weekend.
	 National television said the freed man was an art dealer who
had actually helped set up the delicate "sting" operation that
recovered the priceless 1893 painting.
	 The dealer's lawyer said his arrest had most likely been "a
breakdown in communications" but police declined to comment.
	 Police from Britain helped set the trap by posing as
potential buyers of the famous work, according to news reports.
	 But few official details of the operation were available 
Sunday.
	 "One has been released," was all a Norwegian police
spokesman would say, declining comment on the scheme which
resulted in the painting being found virtually undamaged at a
hotel in southern Norway Saturday.
	 Two people have been charged with assisting in the handling
of stolen goods, but it is still unclear who actually took the
painting from the National Gallery in Oslo.
	 Two men, filmed by video surveillance, climbed into the
gallery in February. They smashed a window, grabbed the painting
and disappeared in less than a minute.
	 "I think we must wait to find out who has done what in this
case," police inspector Leif Lier told national radio, adding
that the case was still under investigation.
	 The daily Dagbladet reported that the three were arrested
after a police set-up. "The accused tried to sell the painting
for three million crowns ($410,000) to two Britons who were
agents from Scotland Yard," the newspaper said.
	 John Butler, head of Scotland Yard's Art and Antique Section
has worked closely with Norwegian police to help recover the
painting of a waif-like figure, wide-mouthed in terror beneath a
blood-red sky.
	 Knut Berg, director of the National Gallery, told Reuters no
ransom had been paid. He said the painting had a microscopic
pinprick but described the work as undamaged.
	 "The thieves must have handled it with extreme caution. It
was wonderful to see the painting again and we hope to have it
back on the wall on Wednesday," he said.
	 The painting, which art experts say is much too famous to be
sold on the open market, was returned to the gallery late
Saturday.
	 It was found -- without its frame -- at a hotel in the
Aasgaardstrand beach resort where Munch had a cottage and where
he painted some of his most famous works.
	 The National Gallery has previously said the painting --
waxed crayon and tempera on cardboard -- could easily be smudged
outside its frame and cover of armored glass.
	 "It's one of our most fragile paintings," Berg said.
	 "The Scream," 36 inches by 29 inches, has been used as the
anguished symbol of a century scarred by two World Wars, the
Holocaust, the atom bomb and modern horrors such as the conflict
in Bosnia.