- Special: Russborough House suffers 4th art raid two days after return of paintings.
Rubens paintings stolen as collection suffers fourth raid
By Catherine Elsworth (Filed: 30/09/2002)
Five paintings valued at more than £31 million, including two Rubens, were stolen yesterday from an Irish art collection that has suffered four major thefts in 30 years.
The raid comes less than a week after the recovery of two paintings stolen from the collection last year and six weeks after police recovered a £20 million Rubens, which was among 18 masterpieces taken from Russborough House, Co Wicklow, in May 1986.
Just after 6am yesterday, thieves broke into the back of the country house and took five paintings from the 150-strong Alfred Beit collection.
The two Rubens were Portrait of a Dominican Monk and Venus Supplicating Mars. The other works taken were The Corn Field by Jacob Van Ruisdael, The Calm Sea by Wilem Van Dervelde and The Adoration of the Sheppard by Adrien Van Ostade.
Both The Corn Field and Portrait of a Dominican Monk have been stolen before in a raid by Martin Cahill, known as "The General", in 1986.
Police and the one resident security officer were alerted immediately by automatic alarms, but the thieves had fled by the time they reached the scene.
Deirdre Rowsome, the house administrator, said: "It's unbelievable. This is the third time since I've been working at Russborough that paintings have been stolen and it's particularly hard to fathom, given we've just recovered three paintings. We really did think it was finally the end of the story."
She said the security in place at the house was "sophisticated" and constantly being improved.
Irish police said a black, four-wheel drive vehicle stolen in Dublin on Saturday was found near the scene and taken away for examination. The thieves had made their getaway in another vehicle across fields behind the house, a spokesman said.
Raymond Keaveney, director of Ireland's National Gallery, said he was saddened by the theft of such priceless works of art.
Last week, police were celebrating the recovery of two paintings stolen in last year's raid on the house in which thieves drove up the steps in broad daylight, rammed the front door and took paintings from the music room.
Portrait of Madame Bacelli by Gainsborough, valued at £2.6 million, and View of Florence by Bernardo Bellotto are still being examined by the National Gallery.
Last month, Rubens's Head of a Man was found in north Dublin after police were tipped off as to its whereabouts. It was the sixteenth of the 18 paintings taken to be recovered.
£2.5m Russborough House paintings theft
(Filed: 27/06/2001)
AN armed gang stole two Old Masters worth more than IR£3 million [about £2.5m] from an art collection at Russborough House in Co Wicklow yesterday.
Despite intensive police activity it was thought last night that the gang had managed to flee the area despite being on foot. Three masked men burst their way into the house after smashing the front door with a jeep-style vehicle at lunchtime.
After grabbing the paintings the men set fire to their getaway vehicle and attempted to hijack a car at gunpoint but its driver refused to give it up. They were last seen running from the scene.
The stolen paintings were Thomas Gainsborough's Madame Baccelli, the more valuable of the pair, and Bernardo Belotto's Scene of Florence.
Chief Supt Sean Feely said: "They fired a shot in an attempt to hijack a car but the motorist refused to hand over his vehicle. There were people in the house at the time of the robbery but no one was hurt." Mr Feely added: "I would think the paintngs would be impossible to sell because they are so well known."
The robbery was a case of history repeating itself for Russborough House, 20 miles from Dublin, which has been the scene of two other major art thefts.
In 1974, an IRA gang which included Dr Rose Dugdale, the British heiress, stole 19 paintings, valued at IR£8 million, from Russborough, the home of the late Sir Alfred Beit, a member of the de Beers diamond family, and his wife. The couple were bound and gagged during the raid. The paintings were later found in Co Cork. Dugdale and others involved were jailed.
In 1986, a 13-strong gang headed by Martin Cahill, the Dublin crime chief who was later shot dead by the IRA, stole 18 works including some of those taken and recovered in the earlier raid. The paintings taken on that occasion included those by Vermeer, Metsu, Goya, Gainsborough and Rubens.
All but three of them turned up over a period of years at a number of locations, including London, Belgium, Holland and Turkey, after apparent unsuccessful attempts to sell them. The Gainsborough stolen yesterday was also taken in the 1986 raid.
The Beit collection was made over to the Irish nation and many of the works are still on show at Russborough. Raymond Keaveney, the Director of the National Gallery of Ireland, described the latest theft as "an outrage".
The raiders may well face familiar problems in disposing of the two paintings. An art expert in Dublin said: "They are not saleable on the open market. Maybe the thieves are hoping a reward will be offered."