You're listening to a stage talk titled Detecting
Stolen Art. This week we're joined by art detective
Arthur Brans. He, alongside law enforcement,
uncovered more than 200 stolen artworks over
his career, from a stolen Picasso to statues
owned by Hitler, that disappeared after the war.
He was able to find them. And, he says, anyone
would be able to do what he does. In this stage
talk he explains how open sources are crucial
to his work, and he shares valuable resources
for those who are curious about the world of
art crime themselves. This talk was hosted by
me, Merel Zut, on Thursday the 31st of July 2025,
in the Bellingcat Discord server. Hello everyone,
welcome back to our stage talks. Today we're
speaking to an art detective which I think might
be one of the coolest job titles there is. Artur
Brandt has recovered over 200 stolen artworks
throughout his career. These include famous paintings
once thought lost from Dalí's to Picasso's. He
uses an array of different techniques to uncover
where these pieces may have ended up. from going
undercover on the black market to more traditional
open source methods. Arthur also works alongside
law enforcement in their pursuit of the thieves
providing expertise and guidance. Despite years
of experience he still maintains that this role
is something anyone could be doing and therefore
Arthur will talk us through his methods using
a real case he worked on and he'll explain how
open sources played an important role in solving
the mysteries. If you have any questions while
he speaks please put them in the chat. And if
you don't want me to share your username, make
sure to share this as well in your questions
so I leave your name out. And due to the complexity
and volume of Arthur's work in the Q &A section,
Arthur will only be answering questions on specific
cases that he has already mentioned in the talk.
We don't unfortunately have time to dig into
all his work. If you want to learn about other
cases not mentioned, you can read Arthur's book
on Hitler's Horses, which we'll put a link for
in the chat, or you can follow him on social
media. Of course, we will have time to dive into
how and why Artur does what he does. And with
that in mind, please, Arthur, if you want to
go ahead and share your story and your work,
you can go ahead now. Okay. Well, everybody,
thank you for joining. My name is Arthur Brand,
called Art Detective. It's not really a title.
You cannot go to university to become an art
detective. It's just... the title that they gave
me. I'm working very close with police forces
all over the world to track down stolen art or
fake art. And the topic that I chose for today
is a recent case that I cracked together with
the police. It was this year and I chose this
one because it has a lot of juicy details, but
also we cracked it through the use of open sources,
which means that you could do the same. So let's
start with this case. You see now for the people
who are watching now, you see now a small painting
on screen and it started with this. This is a
news article. You see a small painting. It says
After 40 years, this painting is first to be
seen again for the public. It was a Dutch museum
who was publishing or was exhibiting this particular
work. And it was made by Pieter Bruegel, a very
important, famous Dutch painter. And to describe
the painting for the people who are listening
and not watching, you see a peasant woman in
a summer landscape. She's wearing two things,
a bucket of water in one hand, And a pair of
tongs with drawing pieces of charcoal in the
other hand. And that's an old Dutch proverb which
says, don't trust anybody with water in one hand
and fire in the other hand. So this painting,
a very important painting from Pieter Bruegel,
as said in the newspaper, was first shown after
40 years. There was this man, John Brosius, he
works for a Dutch magazine called Find. And he
wanted to write an article about this particular
painting. So he started searching for more information
with the title, but he couldn't find anything
on the internet, which is not that strange because
many of the paintings from the 16th, 17th, 18th
century do not have a name. They were just painted.
So the names were put on later. So he couldn't
find anything on the internet, but he didn't
give up. So he did a reverse image search with
this picture from this newspaper. But as you
can see, the painting is shot from the side.
You cannot see it very well. So that didn't work
either. So most people would have given up at
this moment, but John Brosey has walked that
extra mile. So he edited the picture and you
can see that here. He turned it up and then he
put it again through Google images. That's a
good lesson. You never should give up, you know.
Try everything to get what you want to do. And
when he put this image to Google search, he got
a hit. And he watched the painting and he thought,
well, this probably is the same painting. It's
a woman carrying embers and it looks quite similar.
So he started reading through Google Translate.
And the story that he read was quite explosive.
The story said that this painting, woman carrying
embers, was in the possession of a museum in
Gdansk in Poland in World War II in 1944. You
know, in World War II, there was a lot of stolen
art, et cetera. We all know these stories. So
he got interested. He thought, how can it be
that a painting that was in 1944 in a museum
in Poland can now be on exhibition in a Dutch
museum? The Dutch museum got it from a Dutch
family. It was in the possession of a Dutch family
who had lent it out to this museum. So he thought,
how can that be? But when he read more about
the article, he found out that there were more
disturbing things. In 1974, on April 24, a cleaning
lady was working in this museum in Poland, in
the room where this painting of Bruegel was hanging
on the wall. And in a moment of inattention,
she knocks the Bruegel from the wall. The glass
panel protecting this painting shatters into
countless pieces on the floor. And you can imagine
the cleaning lady was shaking. She thought, oh
my God, we are talking about 1974, Poland was
communist country. So she thought, oh my God,
this is so bad news. So she called the curator.
The curator stepped in and she and the curator
both feared for their job. In communist Poland,
you could go to prison for destroying cultural
heritage. The curator leans forward to the floor.
With trembling hands, he picks up the painting.
And to his great surprise, the painting feels
like thin paper. And then he looks better and
he sees that instead of a painting, he has reproduction
in his hands, cut from a magazine. And then,
of course, the penny drops. The painting had
been stolen weeks or months before and had been
replaced by a copy from a magazine, of course,
to mask a theft. So the cleaning lady, of course,
was relieved. She thought, my God, I just uncovered
a theft, but at least I didn't destroy the painting.
But the story gets darker. Of course, the police
starts investigating in 1974, the Polish police,
this theft, and then somebody calls in, and that's
Romwald Werner. Here you see a picture of Romwald
Werner. Romwald Werner was working for the state
in the port of Gdansk. And after the theft, he
read about it in the newspaper, he called the
police and he said, I'm working in a port here,
but there are some people in this port smuggling
stolen art abroad. You must understand that in
communist Poland 74, you know who dared to steal
a painting and who had the connections to smuggle
them abroad. So, Ronald Werner thought that maybe
the Secret Service was involved. So, he called
the police and the police ordered him in for
questioning. Ten minutes before he would enter
the police station, some people nearby, employees
from a cemetery, heard somebody screaming. They
went outside and they saw somebody waving. screaming
he was full of flames somebody had put petrol
over him and he was standing there he fell down
and he died and that person was Romuald Werner.
So it appears according to this article that
some people didn't want him to go to the police
to tell about this theft. The Secret Service
then closed the case Which is strange, of course,
you know, it gave more suspicion to the idea
that the secret service was involved in the theft
of the Bruegel. So Brozius, the Dutch guy who
was reading this article to Google translate,
you know, he was shocked. He thought, oh my God,
this painting was in the war. It was in Poland
until 1974. Then it was stolen. Somebody got
murdered. So he was quite shocked. But the article
said one more thing, that Bruegel painted six
similar paintings of a woman carrying embers.
So Brozis was not sure that the painting that
was now shown in the Netherlands was the same
painting that was being talked about in the article.
So he thought, well, let's contact the Dutch
Museum, who is now exhibiting this painting.
So he wrote them an email, but he got no response.
And he thought, well, sure they have read this
email and they probably figured out that these
two are not the same. Probably the one in the
Netherlands is one of the other five similar
paintings. But little did he know that nobody
read his email because the person who shoot was
on sick leave. So normally here the story ends.
Nobody would have discovered this. But here is
a lesson make yourself known. In the last 15
years, I have done a lot of interviews. I have
my own series on Dutch television. People think
I'm an expert. So I always give the message that
you can contact me if you have questions. Luckily
for me, Brocers, after half a year, he remembered
this case and he thought, well, I know this artifact.
Let's give him a call. You never know. So Brooches
called me and told me the story and I was intrigued
of course, you know, World War II, Bruchel, that's
not a, you know, it's quite a big name, a murder,
probably involvement of the secret service. So
I started to read about this story and I of course
also thought that the museum had read this email
and that most likely the Bruchel in the Netherlands
was not identical, was not the same one that
had been stolen in Poland, but one of the five
others. Roses could not find the five others,
so I started looking for the five others. There
are a lot of websites where you can find art.
One of them is the RKD, which is a huge archive
with hundreds of thousands of paintings. So it
took me three days, but finally I got the other
five identical ones. This is one of them. As
you can see, this is also a woman carrying ambus.
It's almost identical to the one that was stolen
in Poland, but you can see it's not a summer
landscape, but a winter landscape. I found all
the other five and I was now sure, comparing
them all together, that the one in Poland, stolen
in Poland in 1974, was indeed the same one that
was now in the Netherlands. What did I do? I
called the police because, you know, this painting
was stolen in 1974 in Poland. I also found that
it was, this is this picture. You can see it.
This is the list of Poland's most wanted pieces
of art. And on the bottom left, you can see woman
carrying embers of Bruegel. So, it was a very
important painting for Poland, national heritage.
So, I called the police and the police checked
my findings and they went to the Dutch Museum
to secure the painting. Well, you would think
that the story ends here. It was stolen, it was
secured by the Dutch police, but in my field,
in tracking stolen art, there was always a new
twist. Because the first question was, Could
Poland claim the painting? If the Dutch owners
could prove that they had bought the painting
30, 40, 50 years ago in good faith, according
to Dutch law, there would be a problem because
there is something called statute of limitations.
That means that certain crimes after a certain
period of time, cannot be prosecuted anymore.
That means that when you steal something in the
Netherlands after 12 years, you cannot prosecute
the thieves anymore. And as the theft had occurred
in 74, the statute of limitations both in the
Netherlands and Poland about theft had expired.
But of course, there was the murder of Ronald
Werner, most likely linked to this case, to this
theft. So there was a chance, you know, because
normally murder doesn't reach the statute of
limitations, but unfortunately in Poland it expires
after 30 years. So you would think, well, we
have a problem here because legally the owners
in the Netherlands would keep his stolen painting.
But I did some more research, of course, using
Google Translate because I don't speak Polish.
And then I found something Interesting because
Poland has a special law and that says that all
crimes committed during the communist era in
Poland, which ended in 1989, never expire. So
this would mean that Poland could reclaim the
painting. It belonged to them, although it had
been expired according to normal law. because
of this special Polish law, it had not been expired.
But I said in my field of work, there was always
a new surprise because I was triggered by the
fact that, as I told before, that the museum
in Poland had bought the painting, had acquired
this painting in 1944 during World War II. And
we all know World War II, millions of artworks
have been stolen mostly from Jews. So there could
be something tricky there. And we did some more
research and to our big surprise we found out
that the painting indeed before the war had been
in the possession in the collection of a Dutch
family. Of course it's not the same Dutch family
who was now in possession. But before the war
between 1932 and 1941 the painting had been in
Holland. owned by a Dutch family. And here you
can see a picture when this painting by Brugge
was in their collection in 1941. We did some
more research, open sources. All this open source
is what we did. And we found that there was This
was also a big surprise that indeed this family
had claimed that their entire collection had
been not stolen, but they had sold it to the
Germans in 1941, but they said it was under pressure.
You know, if the Germans, the Nazis came to you
and said, we want this painting, we offer you
this amount of money, you hardly could say no,
you know, because if you would say no, you would
be in big problems. After the war, the family
went to the Dutch state and said our whole collection,
including a Bruegel was sold best to the Germans,
but it had not been done voluntarily. And this,
of course, would mean that the painting, although
it was stolen in 1974 in Poland, it had stolen
before in 1941 by the Germans. So in that case,
the painting should not go back to Poland. but
to the family in the Netherlands. So we did some
more research also on open sources and we found
the website of the Dutch Restitution Commission.
In the Netherlands, we have a restitution commission.
It's a state institution. And they had looks
10, 15 years ago into the case of this Dutch
family who had lost or what sold their entire
collection, including the Brugel. to the Nazis
and the Dutch state denied the claim. They said
look you sold it to the Nazis but we have found
no proof that it was not voluntarily. Which means
that this Dutch family could not reclaim anything
of the collection in the future. So case closed
you would say because The Dutch family could
not reclaim the painting, which means it should
go back to Poland. But another problem came up.
As said, the Dutch state had said that the Dutch
family had sold it voluntarily to the Nazis.
brought it to Reichsmarschall Goering. You see
his picture. He is standing next to Hitler watching
art. Goering was a real art lover. And Goering
then transported this painting in 1944 to the
Museum in Rysdansk in Poland, what we have read
before. At that time, that museum was owned by
the Nazis. So the Dutch state had concluded that
the Nazis had bought this painting legally. And
this could mean, I know it sounds strange, but
that the Nazis were the legal owners because
they had paid for it. Of course, the Nazis do
not exist anymore. But if you do a little bit
more research, also through open sources, you
will find that the current German government
is the legal successor of the Third Reich. And
that means two things. They had to pay compensations
to the victims of the Nazis, mostly Jews, of
course. But on the other hand, everything that
was legally owned by the Nazis should go back
to the current German state. I know it sounds
crazy, but that's just the way it is. But I'm
sure that in this case, you know, I cannot think
that the German state will claim this painting,
you know, it would be a scandal, of course. So
my guess is that this painting, which is still
in the Netherlands, will eventually go back to
Poland. to dance to the museum there. And I said
it's considered there as cultural heritage. It's
one of the most important paintings from that
museum. So it's still open what will be decided.
But if you want to follow this story more, you
can follow my socials. But of course, you can
also read press articles about it. There has
been press articles in many languages about this
story. I told this story to show you that these
stories have A lot of juicy details, you know.
Well, murder is not really juicy, but you know
what I mean. World War II, the Nazis, a Dutch
family, a mass theft, the cleaning lady who accidentally
kicks off this painting from the wall. Everything
is in it. And if you give it time and you have
the skills and you are determined to follow up
on such stories, you know, you could do what
we did in this story. So this was my case for
today and now I go back to Merel for the questions.
Thank you Arthur. It's a fascinating story and
I think there are some questions coming in from
the chat right now. The first question is very
straightforward. Is the painting still on the
display now and I'm curious also where? Yes,
the painting is still in the museum in the Netherlands.
It has been secured by the Dutch police. And
well, as you have heard from my story, it's a
very complicated legal issue. The Dutch family
who sold the collection As they said under Dures,
not voluntarily, they might appeal the Dutch
decision from 10, 15 years ago that their collection
was not seized by the Germans. So that can happen.
The Dutch family, who's the current owner of
the painting, could say, look, it might not have
reached the statute of limitations in Poland
because of that special Polish law, but according
to Dutch law, we are the owners. So there are
still a lot, maybe even Germany will reclaim
the painting. So there is still a lot to do.
I drove the police and I who did this together.
I heard from the prosecutor that we drive her
nuts because, you know, it's such a complicated
story. So at the moment it's still in the Dutch
Museum. But my guess is that eventually it will
go back to Poland. And I think it belongs there.
Cyber 4 and 6Pi. asked in the chat how important
was it that you essentially lived in the same
areas as the artwork or that you know about Dutch
law perhaps? Well not at all. I'm a little bit
older than I think most of the people in the
public. I'm still from from an era that there
was no internet. But in these days, you know,
you can find anything everywhere around the world.
And with Google Translate or other means for
translating other languages, you can find anything
everywhere in the world. I found pieces in South
America. I found pieces in South Korea. So in
this case, you know, this John Brosius this guy
who started his investigation, he just was interested
by this painting, you know, a very important
painting that turned up after 40 years. He didn't
suspect anything. When I would have read this
article, I would because, you know, most paintings
are not hidden for 40 years. Of course, in some
cases, yes, because a family owes a painting
and they sell it after 40, 50 years. But normally
it's known where important paintings are. So
if you read something about a painting in a small
newspaper that a painting resurfaced after 40
years, well, it might trigger you to get interested,
you know, and then you start searching for it.
And I think that of 50 % of all the cases that
I cracked, I used open sources. And people always
think that I have some special talent. I don't.
is just using your, you should be determined.
Of course, you should build up a network of people.
Well, we are here at Bellingcat, that's already
a network, but you know, everyone could have
found this painting. I think that's exactly the
type of mindset that a lot of people in this
server and at Bellingcat are following. And that's
also why I see some people asking in the chat,
and maybe you could talk first a bit about How
do you start with an investigation? Because you
said, you explained you tried to get your name
out there, people come to you with clues and
information. Is that how you usually start or
do you also sometimes just stumble upon something
on the internet and start digging into there?
Well, both. I of course know the wet flags, you
know, sometimes I read something about something
and I think, well, this sounds tricky. But in
most cases, not in most cases, but in some cases
I'm being called even by students, art history,
you know, from the United States who tell me,
look, I have an uncle who called me because he
thinks I'm an expert, I'm studying art and he
has a problem with a certain painting which might
have a shady history. And then he contacts me.
If people, if you are out there on the internet,
you know, it's like Bellingcat. They are doing
the same. If people know that you exist, people
from your surroundings might come to you with
questions. So that could be the first link. But
if you start, there are entire websites like
lostart .de, which has thousands of black and
white pictures of paintings stolen during World
War Two. And they are still missing. And I know
of some people who are like me, you know, we
don't have any other hobby than searching stolen
art. And they go from picture to picture and
do reverse image search. And once in a while,
they come up with a story of a painting, a painting
that might have been stolen by the Nazis in Poland,
and turns up somewhere in the Netherlands or
in Japan. So there is so much there out there,
so many venues where you can start, you can read
about it. And I think, you know, who doesn't
love art, who doesn't love history, the stories,
and who doesn't love crime stories? So this comes
all together here, you know. I have other paintings
now, we are working on that, paintings that had
been in the hands of Adolf Hitler, for example.
So, you know, these stories are so great. It's
about the beauty of art and the bad things of
crime. And I think, you know, if you're determined,
if you can make this your hobby, if you have
a few hours to... to kill in the weekend, you
know, it's such a fascinating world. And there
is still so much to find out, you know, I said
www .lostart .de, you can find hundreds of thousands
of paintings which have been lost, but I think
half of them are still out there. And with reverse
image search, Maybe someone in the public is
going to do that tonight, and maybe in two or
three days, he or she finds a painting stolen
from a museum, let's say in France, and he or
she finds them now in the collection of an American
museum. We have done that. And the feeling when
you have this hit, it's the best feeling you
can get. You spoke a bit about some red flags
and telltale signs that you look for when you
think, hey, this is a fishy story. AlpIntel asks
in the chat, what would be telltale signs and
tools to preliminarily, sorry, that word I struggle
with, detect forgeries. So they mentioned UV
lights, radio code, GEMMAs, spectrometers. Can
you tell anything about these? Feltail signs.
Yeah. Yeah. Forgeries are very spectacular. Some
people say, I say that too, that 30%, three zero
of all the art which you can find on the internet
or at auction houses or at museums is fake or
misattributed. 30%. Of course, if you go to an
auction house with a good name like Sotheby's
or Christie's, It's not 30%, it's less, but in
other auction houses, it's more than 30%. So
30 % of all the art on the market is fake. And
there are a lot of ways to find out. You have,
of course, technical ways. You can go to a laboratorium
and to check certain technical stuff. I'm not
an expert in that. but that doesn't hold me back.
I was once called by a person who said, Arthur,
can you help me find out if a certain piece of
art that I own is a fake? And I said, sure. And
she said, it was a woman, she said, but how can
you know? I didn't even tell you which piece
of art it is. How can you be an expert in everything,
you know, because you have paintings, you have
statues, you have everything. And she said, So
you know a lot of experts. And I said, yeah,
yeah, I do know, but that's not the way I work.
And she said, but how do you work? I said, well,
what I always do is when somebody offers me a
painting, I do some research and try to find
out who has faked these paintings in the past.
I'm now doing this work for 15 or 20 years. So
in my red book, I have like a hundred forges
with a telephone number, and I just give them
a call. You know, that's how I start. So I call.
If there was a Giacometti popping up on the market,
there was a very famous Giacometti forger who
was sentenced in Germany to four years in jail.
I have his email address. So I sent him a picture
and I say, Robert, his name is Robert Dreesen,
a very famous forger. Is this piece real? I cannot
ask him, did you fake it or did you force it
because then he would incriminate himself. But
if I ask him, is this piece real? And he sends
back, no. I know that the piece is fake and that
he made it. So there are a lot of ways to find
out if a piece is fake. Read about forges, see
what the techniques are. You can always go to
a laboratory and ask them to test it, but there
are so many red flags that can pop up. Many fakes
that are now on the market, they always have
the story that it was, when you turn the painting,
You see always a fake stamp of the Nazis. They
have to come up the forges with an explanation
that this new fake, which they say that it's
a very old master, that it has not been on the
market, has not been seen for 40, 50 years. That's
of course normal because it was fake yesterday,
but they have to make up a story that it was
hidden somewhere. In these days, you see a lot
of these paintings with a fake German Nazi stamp
on the back. So if you Google a little bit, you
see, oh my God, there are more of these pieces
on the market. Other pieces that show up have
strange provenances. A provenance is the history
of ownership of a painting. If a painting has
been faked, of course, it's just a week on the
market. So it was not in the hands 40 years ago
of someone. a big collector. So what they always
say is it was in the possession of General Franco
or Mussolini or Ceausescu. So they always come
up with these stories. So, and if you read books
about forgeries and there are many on it, one
of them is from Noah Charney from Arca. You also
should follow Arca. They are very good in this.
You will see the tricks and you will see the
red flags. And I think that detecting forgeries
is even more interesting than trying to find
stolen art. Thank you. I have another question
in the chat from Chris, who asks, of the 25 objects
you helped to return to the National Archives
of the Netherlands, which one had the most impact
on you and why? Three weeks ago, I recovered
together with the Dutch police. I always work
with the police. Every step I do, I do with the
police. That's an important lesson because if
you go hunting for criminals or for stolen art,
you are civilian, you know, and you have to follow
the law. So it's always good to have very good
relations with your local police force. You inform
them what you're going to do, et cetera. But
in this case, with the stuff stolen from the
Dutch National Archives, It was in somebody's
cellar and this person was more or less dying.
So family members were searching the cellar and
they discovered an old box with old paper works
and they thought, well, it might be stolen. And
what you see in most cases is that people do
not want to get involved, especially when they
are innocent. So then they destroy these pieces
of art. I always give the message out, before
you destroy stolen art, give me or somebody else
at ARCA or whatever, give us a call, let's discuss
it. Maybe there's a way out for you to bring
it back. And in this case that happened and it
turned out that in this box, there were some
pieces that were declared world heritage by UNESCO,
the VOC, the Dutch East India companies. the
first multinational in the world. And in this
box was, for example, the first meeting of the
Dutch East India Company. A famous logo, the
first company logo in the world was designed
in the book that I found in that box. There was
a ship lock of Michiel de Ruyter. Michiel de
Ruyter is one of the most famous admirals in
history. He was a hero in the Netherlands. He
saved the Netherlands many times, but he's also
still considered one of the... biggest admirals
in history. And then I opened this box and I
see the first journal of this man describing
his travels to South America and that he had
to fight the Spanish in Spain with his ship.
So that's the fun thing of this, whether you
recover a painting, whether you recover a statue
or a box with 17th century ship logs. the first
meeting of the Dutch East India Company. You
know, it's like stepping into Treasure Island.
And I think, thinking about it now, I think that's
the most interesting thing in this field of work.
Every painting you start researching, like this
painting by Bruegel, we started to look for this
Bruegel. Was it stolen or not? You learn so much.
You learn something about communist Poland. You
learn about secret services who killed. for stealing
art. You find things about the Nazis. How did
they work? And in the end, you learn more about
Bruegel. So every story is like a book on itself.
Yeah, that's fascinating. I had the same experience
when recently we were working on the, we made
some art crime challenges on our website together
with Linda from ARCA. And it's so fascinating
how much comes together in this work with the
crime story of it, but also the historic art
and art history information that you learn along
the way. So it's very interesting. If you start
searching for stolen art on lost art or whatever,
and if you feel insecure, you can always ask
Linda from ARCA or myself or other experts. You
just send them an email and you say, look, I'm
new in this field, but Could it be that I just
discovered that this painting stolen by Goering
is now in that museum? They look quite similar.
You know, there are people out there like Linda
and myself and some others. You can always approach
them. Don't feel ashamed, you know, give it a
shot. Could you maybe share some of your favorite
open source research tools that people in this
server could use to get started in this themselves?
Yes, well, first of all, you have there is the
Interpol. app of Stolen Art. You can download
it when you see a painting you can. just make
a picture and this app then shows immediately
whether this painting or statue shows up in the
Paul Stolen database of art. That's one. I said
we have the lostart .de which I use a lot, which
is fascinating. So you have these kind of websites
where there are hundreds of thousands of pieces
of art that had been stolen mostly by the Nazis
and that are still not recovered. So it's an
endless sea of stolen art, you know, and not
that many people are searching for it. You know,
you have Linda, you have myself, you have some
police forces, but that's about it. So there
are maybe 200 people in the world looking for
200 ,000 or more. pieces of stolen art. So you
can use the app of Interpol. You can follow stories
that I put out on my social media. ARCA has a
lot of... They do summer courses. They have a
blog. You know, it all starts with being fascinated
by these stories. And if you follow people like
us, you will come across certain websites which
can bring you further. I started 20 years ago
and... I could hardly distinguish a Van Gogh
from a Rembrandt, you know? Well, this is a bit
exaggerated, but look where I am now. And that's,
I think, because if you feel passionate about
something and you can end up where I am, you
know, give it a shot and feel passionate. And
who is not passionate about art, these stories
which I just told about this Polish, this Bruegel,
you know? who doesn't like these stories, you
know, and it's out there for everyone. George
in the chat is asking, you've been doing this
work for over 15 years now. How did you see art
crime evolve since then? Have you noticed any
emerging trends in the field of art crime? Yes,
of course, we have now internet, we have a lot
of places where people can easily sell now stolen
art. You have the dark web, but In many countries
in the world, we have a problem that the soil
is full of treasures which still have not been
unearthed from the Romans, the Greeks, et cetera.
And of course, an archaeologist should dig them
up. But in many countries, you have people with
metal detectors roaring around and finding these
pieces, maybe gold, silver, and they sell them
on the black market. in the old days it was difficult
you had to find an art dealer but these days
you can you can put them out on ebay or wherever
you know so that's that's a big problem the police
is very focused on that so that has changed and
what you also see is that in the last 10 -15
years in many pieces of the world where these
people are walking around with metal detectors
these grave robbers the credit of our civilization
was in the Middle East. So there is where you
can find the most. Unfortunately, in many of
these countries, there is not a stable government
anymore. And we have seen that certain terrorist
groups took over this world of illicit antiquities.
So we have seen cases in which people linked
to groups like Al -Qaeda or ISIS have been caught
selling art, stolen art on the Western market.
So that has changed. And what also has changed
is that there was more awareness. In the old
days, nobody was that interested, you know, but
in these days, you see that many countries in
South America, in Africa, they say, look, these
pieces once were stolen from us, we want them
back. For many countries, to have these treasures
back, which were once stolen from their countries,
it gives them pride. It should not be that all
these pieces that were illegally found by gravediggers
were smuggled to the West Air and are now here
in collections or in museums. So what you see
is many countries now have stepped in, China,
countries in Africa, countries in South America.
So these are the things that have changed. Alp
Intel asks about your connection and your work
together with law enforcement. How did you first
link up with law enforcement officials and how
does an OSINT investigator or an investigator
like yourself complement law enforcement in this
field? Well, it starts... a little bit strange,
you know, you start to find stolen art and then
you have to call the police. And then the police
says, look, who are you? And I said, well, you
know, I just came from the university. It's my
hobby. And then they say, well, we have a problem
because in most countries, the art squad is very
limited. In most countries, Stolen art is not
a priority. Priorities are terrorism, drugs,
et cetera. But there is always in any country
one, two, three people who are working on art.
So you get to know them, you start working with
them because they have not enough people to do
all the things that they should do. In the beginning,
you know, if you or I or anybody else starts
working in this field and you find something,
the police, of course, is a little bit suspicious.
Who is this man or woman? But in the years, you
know, after 10, after a couple of years, you
earn that trust. And in the end, I'm now working
at this very moment now with five different police
forces all over Europe in cases involving their
countries. and I've been very closely working
together with the German police in the past and
still I'm working with them almost on a daily
basis with the Dutch police, with the Spanish
police. So they do like it when there are people
like also Linda from ARCA and myself, people
who are They always think we are a little bit
crazy, you know, because they at least earn money
with it. We are doing this more or less like
a hobby, but they know some police officers,
you know, they enter this field and after five
years they are being replaced. And people like
Linda and myself are keeping sitting there, you
know, and keeping keep going. What you see is
that many of these police forces are very happy.
They have said about me in many interviews, we
are glad we have Arthur Brandt here in the Netherlands
who is monitoring everything with us and every
steps he does, he does in consultation with us.
So you have to have good relations with the police
and you have to earn that trust, but sooner or
later you will get that trust, if you behave
of course. Okay, I want to remind everyone in
listening in that we only have 10 more minutes,
so please if you have any more questions, this
is the time. I was wondering, can you talk a
bit about the time frame? Does it get more difficult
to look into art pieces that have been missing
for a long, long time? Or does that time frame
not really matter and is it dependent on other
circumstances? The older the better, because...
You know, there have been cases that have been
closed 30, 20, 40 years ago. Nobody is searching
for them anymore. So most cases I do, the statute
of limitations have reached. The best cases are
cases that are 10, 20, 30 years old because the
police is not investigating anymore. Most people
have forgotten about it. So, like this piece,
you know, we talked about the Bruegel. It was
stolen in 74. It was almost forgotten in Poland
until four years ago. They did a big documentary
about it on Polish television. So, can you imagine
how Poland felt when the news broke there that
the painting stolen in 1974 just resurfaced in
the Netherlands? I think the older the stories
are, the better it is. Sometimes when something
gets stolen 50 years ago, people are hiding it
and then they die. And then a son or daughter
finds it on a seller, like the Dutch East India
Company stuff that I recovered, and they try
to sell it maybe on the market. And if you look
for certain pieces, I think that the best Cases
are the cases that are more than 10 years old.
And it's also very cool, of course, to crack
a case that people have been trying to crack
for 50 years and nobody cracks it and then you
crack it. So I think those are the coolest cases.
So even two years ago, there was Madonna, the
famous singer, she was posing for magazine, Vogue,
I think it was. She was posing in front of a
painting and some people in France, a mayor was
watching it and he recognized this painting.
He thought, oh my God, this looks like the painting
that was stolen during World War I in 1918 from
our little town. So even if you look in magazines
like Vogue, you know, you can crack a case that's
over 100 years old. Alina in the chat asks if
AI tools have changed the detection of forged
or solenoid art, if you use those in your work.
I think that they will. I'm not that much into
artificial intelligence yet, but I do think that
it will change a lot. They are now trying to
train artificial intelligence in detecting forgeries.
The problem with detecting forgeries is that
in many cases, it only comes down to some experts
saying, this painting is fake. But then somebody
else said, no, no, this is not a fake. And they
are now training artificial intelligence to do
a better job. And I think in five, 10 years,
artificial intelligence might be better in detecting
fakes than... all the experts that we have had
until now. But I still think that even then artificial
intelligence will never be as good as the best
forges. And if you talk about those cold cases
and that the colder the case, it actually gets
easier to solve. Do you ever stop looking or
is it more that you pause and then might come
back to it later? Yeah. It might be my character,
but I always keep on trying to find a case. I
have here behind on my wall, I have like 40 cases
with leads. Some leads dried up 20 years ago,
but there is always a chance that people die
and children go to the cellar and find stuff.
people die and maybe their brother or their mother.
I get calls from people who tell me, look, from
an old woman who is from a couple of weeks ago.
And she said, well, my son died and my son was
a criminal. And I know that he stole a certain
painting and I don't want to die with this secret.
I recovered Hitler's horses, Hitler's most famous
statues. They were gone since 50, 75 years. And
together with a good friend of mine from the
German police, we managed to recover them. You
know, it made headlines all over the world. I
wrote a book about it. So if that's possible,
if you can find Hitler's favorite statues of
three meters high back after 75 years, everything
is possible. Cool. There's lots to work with
for the people in the server, I think. And we
have another question for from George who asks,
do you have any suggestions for regulatory improvements
that can be implemented on a national or international
level, which could help with some of the challenges
that crimes against art present? Well, it's difficult
to know. I always say on Monday, art was invented.
On Tuesday, the first art was stolen. And on
Wednesday, the first art was forged. It has always
been there. In many cases, we are talking about
a lot of money, you know. pieces of art, which
are worth millions. If you manage to fake a Picasso
and you can set it for 10 million, it's quite
a sum of money. So what I think is what we see
in most countries, as I told before, police is
not really so much interested. There are other
forms of crime. So the police could use the help
of people like me, like Linda, but also of the
public who is now listening. They need us. They
need people who help them search for these paintings.
It's a very big market, the criminal art market.
We're talking here about maybe six to eight billion.
It's quite a big market. And we have a few hundred
police officers around the globe who are working
on it. It's a very big business. And what we
see is that many of them never get caught. If
they get caught, it's very hard for the police
to prove that a certain piece was illegally excavated
in Italy, for example. So it's a field where
criminals in the last decades had free game.
And some of them get caught. But with today's
internet, it also gets easier for people like
me, but also from people who want to start today,
to track down stolen art. And I said with artificial
intelligence, it might be helpful, but I think
our theft and art forgery, unfortunately will
never stop. I said it has always been there,
and as soon as there is a lot of money involved,
Even the biggest auction houses like Christie's
and Sotheby's have been victim of forgeries,
you know, and the best experts in the world are
working there. So it's very hard to cover it
all. I can imagine. And just to give people a
bit of guidance as a last question, I think almost,
do you see any patterns in cases that you've
covered. Do you see repeatable steps that thieves
take to evade law enforcement? Or is every case
unique? Every case is unique, but never forget,
most people think that the art world is about
beauty. Well, it isn't. It's about money. And
if it's about money, people are capable of everything.
Respected auction houses, respected art dealers,
Some of them, not all of course, have been caught
red handed because if there's so much money at
stake, people do things that they shouldn't do.
So be aware always, we are talking here about
a big market, big reputations, a lot of money
at stake and people do very, very strange things
for money. And we see that all the time in the
art world. museums of big names, the biggest
museums in the world, they have bought pieces
of which they knew or could have known that they
were not legally acquired. And that's because,
you know, they wanted to have these pieces. So
be aware that you are working in a field of high
egos, a lot of money and some bad people. That
sounds fun. And just to get Pio's excitement,
do you have any recommended reading for people
that want to get into this field and learn a
bit more about the world of art crime? Yes, follow
ARCA. They have a blog. You can follow me on
social media. There are books out there. I already
mentioned Noah Charney. He's a professor who
does a lot of research about art crime. He has
written a lot of books about it. There are many
books out there. Well, follow me on social media
and follow Arka. That's a good start, you know.
There's much more. And I know Linda is listening
probably, so that's a good way to start, you
know. Arka and myself and some books. There are
many books out there. Amazing. Linda was definitely
listening and putting all kinds of helpful resources
in the chat as well. And we'll make sure to list
everything in our show notes as well in the version
that is going to be recorded, that was recorded,
and that we'll share on a podcast platform. So
you can find all these resources back. And I've
also seen a lot of people talk about the ArtCrime
server we have here on our Discord server. In
that channel, people have been discussing this
topic for quite some time. And this is also the
place to discuss and help each other find find
out more about this fascinating world. And this
was a great introduction, Arthur. Thank you very
much for giving some insights in your work and
for all the tips for the people that want to
get started with this. And thanks, everyone,
for listening in and for all your questions.
I'll end the recording here and the recording
will appear on your streaming platforms in the
coming days. And in two weeks, we'll be back
with a new stage talk. So make sure to tune in.
Thank you for listening to the stage talk. If
you'd like to catch a stage talk live where you
can ask the guest questions, join the Bellingcat
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Bellingcat. The music you've heard is titled
Dawn by Newer Self and is courtesy of Artlist.