The painting, “Woman-Ochre,” is now worth more than $100 million and is safely back at the university museum.The ABC15 Investigators got an exclusive list of nearly 90 pieces of Arizona art in the FBI’s National Stolen Art File.
Police have only released a grainy, black-and-white photo of the painting titled “Oiseau et Bouquet,” which means “Bird and Bouquet.” The painting was valued at $495,000 when taken. Chagall paintings have only increased in value since then. One Chagall recently sold for $7 million. The statue was valued at about $18,000 when stolen, he said. The last one he sold in 2002 went for six figures.
The stolen statue has Lundeen’s signature on the base along with the edition number of the sculpture: No. 10.Employees at the Tucson Museum of Art were setting up for an artisan craft market in November 2003 when a painting by a local Western artist, Jack Van Ryder, went missing.