Vic: $120,000 of uninsured paintings stolen in gallery raid

AAP General News (Australia)
02-14-2006
Vic: $120,000 of uninsured paintings stolen in gallery raid

By Jamie Duncan

MELBOURNE, Feb 14 AAP - Uninsured Aboriginal art worth up to $120,000 was stolen from
a gallery in central Melbourne early today.

But the gallery reckons it will be difficult to sell.

"Art is not really something that is usually stolen because it's so hard to sell on
the market," said gallery director Maryanne Hollow.

The burglary was at Aboriginal Galleries of Australia in Spring Street about 3.30am
(AEDT) today, police said.

Police believe three intruders used a metal pipe cover to smash the front door of the gallery.

Ms Hollow estimated between 10 and 12 works were taken from the gallery valued at between
$100,000 and $120,000.

These included a 1994 unstretched acrylic on canvas painting by the late Northern Territory
artist Emily Kame Kngwarreye, which Ms Hollow said was valued at between $50,000 and $60,000,
and a natural ochre on canvas painting by Kimberley region artist Freddy Timms valued
at $5,000 to $7,000 people.

The Kngwarreye work was to be photographed for an exhibition in New York to open on
February 28, Ms Hollow said.

She was unsure how many works were missing.

"We think 10 to 12 works have been stolen," Ms Hollow told AAP.

"We can see them on the video footage and we can see some of the paintings but I will
have to do a final stocktake because we don't even know what is missing.

"They (the works) are not insured, either."

Ms Hollow said it was the first time in her 15 years in the business that the gallery
had been burgled.

"We had one painting stolen before, but it was returned to us with a note on it saying
the person had stolen it from the gallery but it gave them a strange feeling so they gave
it back," she said.

"That was two or three years ago. It was not an expensive piece - it was worth a couple
of hundred dollars - and, to be honest, I hadn't noticed it was gone."

The art would be hard for the thieves to sell, Ms Hollow said.

"Art is not really something that is usually stolen because it's so hard to sell on
the market," she said.

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KEYWORD: GALLERY

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