(News)
– The pandemic is bad news for art patterns because museums are mostly closed. Art thieves on the other hand seem to be doing OK. For the second time since the pandemic began, a painting was stolen from a shuttered museum in the Netherlands, Reuters reports. In March, it was a Van Gogh – see the theft in action at the Singer Laren Museum. Now it is a painting called “Two Laughing Boys”, made by Frans Hall in 1626. It has been stolen twice before. Police say they responded to alarms at night in the small Hofje van Aerden Museum near Utrecht and discovered that a back door was open, reports AP.
The Hals painting is owned by the museum and valued at nearly $ 18 million, per DutchNews. The same painting was stolen from the museum in 2011 and recovered six months later; in 1988 it was stolen and three recovered years letter. Security was increased after the 2011 theft, and the piece was restricted to an area where visitors had to be escorted. Hals is perhaps best known for his painting “The Laughing Cavalier”, according to Reuters. (The Van Gogh painting has not been recovered, but “proof of life” photos have been taken.)
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