Four works attributed to 15th-century Sicilian painter Antonello da Messina were stolen overnight from the Museo Regionale di Messina, according to Italian media reports citing a statement from the museum's directorship.
Four Antonello da Messina paintings stolen from Museo Regionale di Messina
Four works attributed to 15th-century Sicilian painter Antonello da Messina were stolen overnight from the Museo Regionale di Messina, according to Italian media reports citing a statement from the museum's directorship.
The theft occurred on the night of August 15, a national holiday in Italy, according to media reports. The thieves removed three of the five remaining panels of an altarpiece known as the Polittico di San Gregorio, which originally comprised six panels and was created for the Monastero San Gregorio, a local monastery destroyed by Messina's 1908 earthquake. The altarpiece was described as the only work by Antonello da Messina to have never left his hometown.
The thieves also took a fourth artwork from a secure display case: a small two-sided painting depicting the Virgin with Child and a Franciscan monk on one side and Christ on the other. That work was part of the Wilhelm Soldan collection and was sold by Christie's to the Sicilian Region in 2003, the same year it was attributed to Antonello da Messina.
A museum official reached by Reuters said they could not provide any information.
- The source does not state how the thieves gained entry to the museum.
- The source does not identify any suspects or report whether arrests have been made.
- The source does not state whether Italian law enforcement or the Carabinieri TPC (art theft unit) have opened an investigation.
- The source does not report the estimated value of the stolen works.
- The source does not identify which two panels of the Polittico di San Gregorio remain at the museum.
- The source text supplied appears truncated; some material may be missing.
Read the original at New York Post