Brave SA anti art theft initiative launched by Interpol and D.A.C



Staff writer

A brave attempt at retrieving stolen heritage goods has been launched by the local branch of Interpol and Department of Arts and Culture with the launch of a website and call in service.

According to SAHRA prime suspects seem to be knowledgable museum staff and the local art underworld

It has been common knowledge for some time that South Africa’s art museum storerooms, institution’s collections, churches and galleries have been, and are currently being fleeced. The main attributing factors are lack of auditing of art items on a centralized database: documentation that proves that the item is actually legally owned by the museum, and of course, lack of effective security.

Ms C Muller (SAHRA) said “We began to notice this art theft in 1998, although obviously it must have been going on for some time before that. Mostly these are inside jobs – for instance you will remember that two or three years ago a Pierneef was casually cut out of its frame at SABC Auckland Park headquarters and disappeared through their tight security with no trouble whatsoever.
People posing as tourists with big backpacks wander through our museums gabbling in foreign languages and if it’s a small place with no hidden cameras – , next thing when they lock up a few more valuable items on display are gone”

People in the know have knowledge of what is in the store room and has been sitting there for ages without being documented. Nothing is ever broken into and burgled but somehow the cupboard becomes barer and barer. A few years ago some priceless Goya prints belonging to a University Print Cabinet Collection went missing - dispite that they were locked away behind two sets of locks - simply disappeared – not recovered so far.

In a recent conversation Art Times had with John de Beer of the website art.co.za, he said that after placing a stolen art webpage on his popular website it proved a fruitless exercise to try to keep up with what has gone missing. Contact with Interpol stolen art division elicited the info from an official that the hundreds of artworks on the new Interpol website – where only the well known works shown, represented just a few of the thousands of artworks that go missing each year.
In trying to obtain copyright to reproduce some of the stolen works SA Art Times was informed that one would need to pay for Interpol CD Roms that would cost over R 3600 and that no concessions in price would be made.
For the latest in top art crime hits – go to www.interpol.int/Public/WorkOfArt
For a localized out of date record go to: /www.art.co.za/stolenart
To contact your local Interpol – Stolen Art person call: Captain BJ van Rensburg (INTERPOL) (012) 309 3005/ 3155, Supt B Benson (Organized Crimes) 012 393 3774/1056, or Ms. C Muller (SAHRA) 021 462 4502