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Armed men rob Sao Paulo library in Brazil, steal engravings worth millions of euros by artists Matisse and Portinari!
2025-12-08 20:37:16 / BOTA
Two armed men stole eight engravings by renowned French artist Henri Matisse and five works by his Brazilian colleague Candido Portinari from a library in the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo, where an exhibition was being held, on Sunday.
“They threatened a guard and an elderly couple visiting the exhibition,” police told AFP. They then “went to a glass case where the works and documents were displayed,” placed them in a “canvas bag” and “left through the main entrance,” according to the same source.
The city hall confirmed the theft at the Mario t'Andratx library in the center of the Brazilian metropolis. According to the news site G1, the perpetrators were identified thanks to surveillance cameras and authorities are conducting an investigation to find them.
Authorities have not released details about the works by Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Cândido Portinari (1903-1962) that were stolen.
The engravings were on display as part of the exhibition “From Book to Museum,” a collaboration between the library and São Paulo’s Museum of Contemporary Art, MAM. The exhibition, which opened in October, brought together rare books and works from the 1940s and 1950s. It closed yesterday.
A statement issued by the city about the exhibition said the works were from the MAM collection, without specifying which ones. According to Folha de São Paulo, the stolen works include collages from Matisse's Jazz album, published in France in 1947. It is estimated that only 300 copies exist worldwide.
"Their cultural and artistic value is priceless," art critic and art conservator Tandeu Chiarelli was quoted as saying by the newspaper. "Their theft is very bad," he added.
The jazz album is part of a series of "rare," "fundamental" books that juxtapose "Brazilian artists and scholars of European modernism," according to a note from the exhibition's curators.
Some sixty sketches by Henri Matisse, one of the most important creators of modern art in the 20th century, sold for more than $2.5 million at a Christie's auction in October, according to the specialist website Artnet. The record for a work by the French artist was set in 2018, when the painting "Odalisque couchée aux magnolias" (1923) sold for $80.8 million by the same house.
The five engravings stolen by Candido Portinari, one of Brazil's most famous artists, were part of the book Menino de Engenho (Boy from the Plantation, 1959) by José Lins do Hegu, according to the municipality.
“These are rare works, it is unlikely that anyone will buy them,” Chiarelli said. In 2007, a painting from the series O labrador de café (The Coffee Farmer) was stolen from the São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP), according to G1.
The library robbery in the Brazilian metropolis comes after the movie-worthy heist at the Louvre Museum, where jewelry and a tiara worth at least 88 million euros were stolen. Four members of the group suspected of carrying out the robbery were arrested, but it is still unclear what happened to the stolen goods, as well as the mastermind or masters.
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