£8m art haul near Dublin

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33520, 29 April 1974, Page 13

£8m art haul near Dublin

| (NZ.P. A.-Reuter —Copyright)

\ DUBLIN. April 28

i The Irish police are today awaiting a ran- ! som demand for 19 valuable paintings, the cream (of one of the finest collections in Europe, which were stolen in the world's largest art theft. The Dublin authorities are convinced that the motive was political. The paintings were taken by three armed men and a girl who raided an eighteenthcentury country mansion at Blessington, near Dublin, on Fridav night. Among the stolen works, estimated to be worth at least £Bm. were masterpieces bv Vermeer. Goya. Gainsborough. Rubens. Velazquez. Mnrrulh. and Metsu. All of the oaintings are easily identifiable. whim would make them unsaleable on the art market, and the nolice expect a demand fi r ransom in rhe form of cash or. more likely, the release of nolitical prisoners. “We are looking at a’l angles*- including possible

I.R.A. involvement, a police spokesman said.

i The paintings were owned jby Sir Alfred Beit, aged 71, la millionaire whose family (found their fortune in the 'gold and diamond mines of (South Africa. I Sir Alfred Beit and his wife (were tied with nylon stockpngs during the raid.

I “The three men were local j thugs, but the girl, who spoke (with a heavy French accent, appeared to know what she ;was about,” Sir Alfred Beit said. “I haven’t the faintest idea who they were, or what they represented, but they made violent and insulting anti - capitalist remarks — something about us being exploiters of the working-class I was called a capitalist pig as the thieves ripped the paintings from their frames.” Sir Alfred Beit said las’ night that he would refuse to pay any ransom, but he may not have the final say: some of the paintings were heavily insured, and international insurance syndicates would be directly concerned with any ransom demand.

One of the missing paintings, “A Lady Writing a Letter with her Maid.” bv the seventeenth-century Dutch

i master, Jan Vermeer, is alone valued at more than the equivalent of SNZ4.7m. Only three other Vermeers are in private collections: one is owned ny the Queen, and the other two belong to artlovers who prefer not to be identified. Part of the Beit family’s art. collection was given to the National Gallery in Dublin when Sir Alfred Beit, after leaving politics in 1945. moved to South Africa, where he lived for a number of years.

In 1954. he decided to settle in Ireland, and brought 33 paintings with him from South Africa to Rossborougn, to hang in the Georgian mansion built by the German architect, Richard Cassals. It stands in a 600-acre estate in the lake district west of Dublin, and overlooks the lake at Blessington. Sir Alfred Beit believed that the site would make an ideal background for his pre-: cious art works.

Descriptions of the four thieves have been circulated throughout the world through Interpol. Irish sea and air ports are being closely watched. A car whicbanay have been

! used by the thieves was found abandoned 70 miles from the scene of the robbery.