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IT was amid the St Patrick's Day celebrations of 1990 that two thieves made off with around $300 million worth of art - the most valuable art heist in history.
The Storm on the Seaof Galilee by Rembrandt was one of more than a dozenworks stolen by the mystery art burglars during the 1990 heistin Boston. Picture: SUPPLIED
AP
Wearing long coats and flashing badges, the two men arrived at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts at 1.24am.
They told the guard on duty they were responding to a call, and he let them in through the museum’s security door.
The thieves were able to convince the guard to leave his post - and the museum’s only alarmbutton - by telling him he was wanted for arrest.
He was instructed to call over the only other guard on duty, and both were promptly handcuffed to pipes in the museum’s basement.
The two guards werecarefully positioned some distance from each other, and each was secured with duct tape around their heads, hands and feet.
The thieves then took their time, spending around 80 minutes scouring the galleries and their vast collection of antiquities and art.
Three pieces by Rembrandt were removed from the Dutch Room on the second floor of the museum, along with Vermeer’s priceless The Concert , one of only 36 known worksby the Dutch master.
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The Concert is considered the most valuable of the piecestaken. It was the firstmajor work bought by museum founder Isabella Stewart Gardner, who had opened her collectionof treasures to the public in 1903.
Rembrandt’s painting The Storm of the Sea of Galilee was cut from its frame. A tiny etched Rembrandt self-portrait and another oil, A Lady and A Gentleman in Black , were also grabbed.
Govaert Flinck’s Landscape with an Obelisk , which had been thought a Rembrandt for decades until formally identified asthe work of his pupil,was also taken from the Dutch Room, along with an ancient bronze Chinese vase dating from around 1200 BC.
Manet’s Chez Tortoni was stolen from another of the galleries.
This undated file photo released by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum shows the painting, Chez Tortoni, by Manet, one of more than a dozen works stolen during the 1990 heist. Picture:
Five drawings by Edgar Degas were removed from their place atop a wooden cabinet in the museum’s short gallery, where a gilt bronze eagle that once sat atop a Napoleonic flag was also taken after perhaps being mistaken for gold.
Priceless works by famed artists such as Michelangelo, Raphael and Titian were left behind by the thieves.
But the security footage that captured their spree was not, leaving investigators to only speculate as to why certain pieces were grabbed and in what order - if any.
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Hopes that a clue would be found in the parting words of the ransackers - “tell them they’ll be hearing from us” - faded as the days passed without contact from the thieves.
Early leads led the FBIto explore links to the IRA, South American drug cartelsand local mobsters.
Some of the several thousand tips and alleged sightings of the missing works led to fruitless hunts across the globe, from Italy to Japan.
The museum hired itsown private investigators, but they also came up empty-handed.
A plaque marks the empty frame from which thieves cut Rembrandt's The storm on the Sea of Galilee during the 1990 heist. It remainson display at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. Picture: AP
Known art thieves and their associates were pursued and questioned, includingcareer criminal William Youngworth.
Youngworth had dealings with the FBI and the museum in 1997 in which he reportedly offered to lead them to the missing property. He was hoping for a dealthat would see some outstanding criminal charges dropped.
A newspaper reporter was shown a painting purporting to be Storm On The Sea Of Galilee in a darkened factory in 1997, and later sent photographs and paint chips as “evidence” he knew where they were.
But the museum refused to deal with him after declaring the photographs were not genuine, and the paint chips tested were found to be the right vintage, but not likely to havecome from a Rembrandt.
His associate, notorious art thief Myles Connor, would later pen the memoir The Art of the Heist: Confessions of a Master Art Thief, Rock-and-roller, and Prodigal Son .
He has long been considered a likely mastermind of the heist, despite having been behind bars at the time.
US Police search the yard of Robert Gentile using ground-penetrating radars in May this year in a bid to find the paintings stolen. Picture: Jessica Hill Source: AP
But the investigation largely stalled until last year, when the FBI again examined possible ties to the mob.
Criminal Robert Gentile, 76, was quizzed for months over his knowledge of the heist.
The widow of a mafia identity that authorities say had connections to all their major suspects in the heist had allegedly passed on astolen work to Gentile.
But he recently gave evidence before a Grand Jury that he did not know who stole the artworks from the museum, or where they were.
The museum - which was not insured - hasa $5 million reward on offer for the works.
And for the past 22 years the Rembrandt frames in the Dutch room have remained empty, in the hope that one day the paintings will be returned.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law-order/two-thieves-still-on-the-run-22-yeras-after-stealing-300-million-worth-of-art-from-isabella-stewart-gardner-museum/story-fnat7dag-1226522265886