Edouard Cortes. Flower Market Madeleine

Long Lost Painting from New York City Heist Recovered after 60 Years

London, 21 November 2023:

Art Recovery International is pleased to announce the recovery of a stolen painting by Edouard-Leon Cortés, one of 3000 paintings stolen from the Herbert Arnot Gallery in New York City over a 12-year period in the 1950s and 1960s.

In 1966, Louis Edelman, gallery manager and salesman for the Arnot Gallery at 250 West 57th Street, decided to leave his job there to open his own gallery nearby. It was later discovered that during his tenure, Edelman was selling the Arnot Gallery’s paintings and invoicing buyers in his own name. By the time he was done, Edelman had absconded with over 3000 artworks worth over $1M from his employer.

The thief was eventually arrested in Chicago by the FBI and convicted of transporting stolen artworks across state lines, a federal crime.  While Edelman was sentenced to two years in prison and given a $10,000 fine, most of the 3000 paintings were never recovered.  Edelman sold most of the paintings in Chicago, Kansas City, and St. Louis. During the criminal trial, one gallery owner was questioned on whether he knew the paintings he was buying from Edelman were stolen.  “Well, not all of them”, he answered.

Over the years, the stolen artworks have been reappearing for sale at auction houses and galleries around the world.

The Arnot Gallery was started in Austria in 1863 and held several retrospectives for Egon Schiele, Claude Monet, and Edouard-Leon Cortés. The Hapsburg emperor often came to the gallery, which was located across from the Vienna Opera House, and would point to paintings he wished to purchase with his feet.  The gallery was forced out of Austria when the Nazis came to power and was re-established in New York City as the Herbert Arnot Gallery.  At one point, the Arnot Gallery was the largest US importer of commercial European Art.

This Cortès, entitled Flower Market Madeleine was being offered for sale in 2023 by Carnes Fine Art, a dealer in Mawdesley, England. Carnes purchased the artwork in November 2022 at Capes Dunn auctions, which have been operating outside of Manchester, England since 1826.  The painting had been consigned to Capes Dunn in 2022 by a Cheshire estate who confirmed that it was acquired from the MacConnal-Mason Gallery in London.

Christopher A. Marinello, lawyer and founder of Art Recovery International spent several months unwinding this sale.  “We are very grateful to Bradley Carnes, Capes Dunn, and their vendor for releasing this stolen painting unconditionally to the Arnot Gallery. While in this instance, we were able to convince many of the parties to reimburse the other, eventually there will be those who are out of luck.  I cannot stress enough the importance of performing due diligence and authentication checks which would have uncovered this stolen painting decades earlier.”

Marinello added, “Anyone buying or selling a painting by Edouard-Leon Cortés or Antoine Blanchard is advised to check with the Arnot Gallery for proper authentication. We have been recovering one or two pictures per year from this 60-year-old theft and we’re never going to give up until every last one is returned”. ENDS

Images are available via this Dropbox link below. Photos courtesy of Art Recovery International, LLC

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/aptt1y2dwzetxpmuprpoc/h?rlkey=kw00aazq4sqb8llonhmuygswq&dl=0

Christopher A. Marinello, Esq.
Founder & CEO, Art Recovery International, LLC
chris@artrecovery.com
+44 (0)7702 206 913