Rembrandt’s 1632 painting, Portrait of Jacob III de Cheyn/Gheyn, is the most stolen painting in the world. It has been stolen and recovered four times since the 1960s. Before jumping to conclusions about its remarkable desirability, you should know that its small size (about 12″ h x 10″ w) and a lack of security help explain its disappearances.
Rembrandt's Jacob III de Gheyn/Cheyn--stolen and recovered four times since the 1960s.
Amazingly, no one has been charged with its theft in any of its four disappearances.
The painting has been given the monikers “takeaway Rembrandt” and “Rembrandt to-go.” According to another source,
“Between 14 August 1981 and 3 September 1981 the painting was taken from Dulwich Picture Gallery and retrieved when police arrested four men in a taxi who had the painting with them. A little under two years later a burglar smashed a skylight and descended through it into the art gallery, using a crowbar to remove the painting from the wall. The police arrived within three minutes but were too late to apprehend the thief. The painting was missing for three years, eventually being found on 8 October 1986 in a luggage rack at the train station of a British army garrison in Münster, Germany. The other two times, the painting was found once underneath a bench in a graveyard in Streatham, and once on the back of a bicycle.”
It must be about the thrill of the theft.