Van Gogh paintings recovered by Italian anti-Mafia police

ROME — Anti-Mafia police in Naples have recovered two Vincent van Gogh paintings stolen from Amsterdam in 2002, the Van Gogh Museum and organised crime investigators said on Friday (Sept 30).

In a statement released on Friday on its website, the museum said the paintings, found without their frames, are in “relatively good condition”. It said the two paintings are the 1882 work View Of The Sea At Scheveningen, also known as Seascape At Scheveningen; and a later work, Congregation Leaving The Reformed Church In Nuenen.

Police in Naples said the paintings are of “priceless value” and were discovered during a raid as part of a crackdown against a Naples-based Camorra crime clan suspected of cocaine trafficking. Naples prosecutors said more details will be given later at a news conference in the southern Italian city.

The paintings were sequestered along with other property, worth “tens of millions of euros”, said the police. The Financial Guard, a branch of the Italian police, often sequesters financial assets of suspected criminals.

“After all these years, you no longer dare count on a possible return,” the museum quoted its director Alex Rueger as saying, and expressed gratitude to Italian investigators and police.

The museum said the paintings, inspected by a curator, do show “some damage” and it is unclear when they will return to Amsterdam. AP