Don't Steal This Art or This Book

Joshua Knelman's new book Hot Art - Chasing Thieves and Detectives through the Secret World of Stolen Art (Douglas & McIntyre) is being reviewed all over and I'm pleased for him given the legwork he put in to write it. Philip Marchand in the National Post (see blog September 16, 2011) offered high praise, with Iris Nowell in the Globe criticizing JK for his stylistic approach and for leaving out certain types of art theft. James Macgowan in the Sunday Star also praised the book and had me nodding in agreement until the final paragraph. Then he lost me as surely as I lose lures every fishing season. Macgowan acknowledges that the looting of the National Museum in Baghdad, for example, was a terrible act, but goes on to ask if the theft of a Group of Seven painting owned by "Sir-Lots-of-Money" affects anyone but the owner. Really? I mean, really? (as SNL's Seth Myers and Amy Poehler might say.)

Of course the theft of cultural property affects everyone, irrespective of who owns it. That's because art, even privately owned and displayed art, is part of a country's heritage and is thus, at one remove, a part of everyone, whether it's Canadians and their kinship with Franklin Carmichael and Alex Colville or the English and theirs with Constable and Turner, or the Italians with Tintoretto and Caravaggio, and so on. A legitimate owner may lend or donate a work or works to a gallery or exhibition or other public space. On a wall in an office in Hogtown there's a gloriously vivid acrylic by Ted Harrison that the good doctor who inherited it decided to share with his patients. It's hard to imagine a buyer of stolen art allowing his ill-gotten purchases to travel beyond his own four walls. Those who steal art are thieves and no different from bank robbers and should treated as such, despite what Macgowan thinks about spending our money on pursuing "real" criminals instead.

Hot Art in Hogtown

In July I wrote a story on art theft for the National Post that was as stimulating and intriguing as anything I've written for some time. One of the sources I spoke to was Joshua Knelman, who likely knows as much about purloined paintings - all on the up and up, of course - as anyone here in Hogtown. He should, after all, since he's spent the last few years researching the subject. The result of his work is a new book from Toronto publishers Douglas & McIntyre called Hot Art - Chasing Thieves and Detectives through the Secret World of Stolen Art. Josh will be promoting the book at a Globe and Mail/Ben McNally Books Brunch Sept. 18 and attending a private party the same day. Hot Art comes out officially Sept. 24 and the timing couldn't be more perfect. I have a few months to put away some cash to buy a copy or two as Christmas presents.