"Double Portrait of Elector John Frederick of Saxony and His wife Sibylle of Cleve," which was stolen by Stéphane Breitwieser and presumably destroyed (via Wikimedia Eatables)

Every bit the saying goes, do what you honey for a living and y'all'll never work a mean solar day in your life. But in the instance of the world's nearly successful fine art thief, Stéphane Breitwieser, it might ameliorate be said, steal what yous love and yous'll make headlines, but never a living. As a comprehensive story published last week by Michael Finkel for GQ reveals, Breitwieser, along with his girlfriend and accomplice Anne-Catherine Kleinklaus, were so successful in their art thieving, in function because they kept what they took. Sometimes working alone, but often with the help of his girlfriend, Breitwieser amassed a individual collection of stolen art objects worth more than a billion dollars, and hoarded it in their attic living quarters of his mother'south house in the Alsace region of French republic. The hamlet where they lived is bordered by Germany and Switzerland — all countries that were targets of Breitwieser'due south obsessive thievery, forth with his favorite target, Kingdom of belgium.

Finkel'due south story dramatically details Breitwieser'due south rise and fall, including his highlights reel of daring thefts and shut escapes, before the 2001 arrest that predicated the destruction of his drove by his mother, Mireille Stengel, in some combination of rage and beloved. Breitwieser served a scant 4 years for the theft of those 200 objects, including 140 pieces recovered from a culvert where Kleinklaus and Stengel jettisoned them, and 66 paintings — some individually valued at millions — that were burned past his mother in an effort to destroy testify (a criminal offence for which she also served jail time). As reported by GQ, according to the director of the London-based Art Loss Register, the virtually comprehensive database of stolen art, more than 99 per centum of art thieves are motivated by profit rather than aesthetics, leading fine art crimes to typically be solved when the thieves attempt to sell the work. Breitwieser's sincere, obsessive love for his stolen treasure kept information technology from always reaching the marketplace, thereby making it not so much an art theft "career" equally an all-consuming hobby. To hear Finkel tell information technology, Breitwieser was devastated past the loss of his collection, and never fully recovered — backsliding was always in the cards. Later a second stint in prison, post-obit the 2005 theft of a painting by Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Breitwieser was one time more arrested last month, the culmination of a police force sting that has been ongoing since 2016.

Finkel'south article helpfully details some of the techniques that, along with an iron nerve and a preference for social Stoicism, helped Breitwieser to salvage some 200+ separate hosts of their possessions — targets included art fairs, museums, churches, and antiquarian vendors.

Since he's gone public with these tactics, Hyperallergic has asked me to reveal what I would steal, if I could get abroad with information technology. In the interest of off-white play, I inquire that international security forces reinforce their monitoring of the following targets:

  • The Unicorn Defends Itself (from The Unicorn Tapestries)(1495-1505) on display at the Cloisters
  • Queen Mary's Dolls' House (1921-1924), of the Royal Drove
  • "The Suicide of Dorothy Hale" (1938) by Frida Kahlo
  • "Many Came Back" (2005) by El Anatsui — or, since the Isabella Stuart Gardener Museum has suffered enough, "Taago" (2006) from the High Museum in Atlanta
  • Pretty much any William Eggleston photo I could get my grubby mitts on, but especially these.
  • Jared Keeso's heart (Jared! Everything you lot practise is art!)

I mean, now that I get started, I run across how this could become to exist a trouble … In decision, stealing is bad, the over-commodification of art which divorces information technology from the wellspring of self-expression and collective humanity is also bad, and someone please inquire Jared Keeso to give me a call if he's single. Proceed it legal, friends!

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Sarah Rose Sharp is a Detroit-based writer, activist, and multimedia artist. She has shown work in New York, Seattle, Columbus and Toledo, OH, and Detroit — including at the Detroit Found of Arts.... More by Sarah Rose Sharp