Two works by artist Andy Warhol were stolen overnight from Thursday to Friday from an Art gallery in the south of the Netherlands, while two other screen prints were found abandoned in the street.
The burglars used heavy explosives to enter the MPV Gallery in Oisterwijk (Brabant), and seized two screen prints representing Queens Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and Margrethe of Denmark, reports the Dutch media NOS.
“The front door to the gallery has been blown out and there is glass all around the building. The windows on the rest of the street are also broken,” describes NOS.
If we still have too little information about this theft, “it is strange that explosives were used“, said Arthur Brand, famous art detective in the Netherlands. “This is not common for art thefts“added Mr. Brand, known for having found works by Picasso or Van Gogh in the past.
Works by Andy Warhol, from the Pop Art pioneer’s “Reigning Queens” series, were stored in the gallery for sale at the PAN Amsterdam art fair between November 24 and December 1.
Two other works from the same series, representing Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands and Queen Ntombi Tfwala of Eswatini, formerly Swaziland, were abandoned in the street, the four works not fitting into the criminals’ car, according to NOS.
“The paintings are worth a considerable amount of money“, local media Omroep Brabant reported, quoting MPV Gallery owner Mark Peet Visser.
Arthur Brand declared that the stolen works were “notnot unique“and that Andy Warhol had probably made dozens of them.”It is therefore easier to sell them than unique works, but not that much“, he added.
MPV Gallery was not immediately able to respond to a request for comment.
Produced in 1985, two years before Andy Warhol’s death, the “Reigning Queens” series represents the four queens who were in power at that time.
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