Art Scams and Stolen Art news at Art News Blog is a listing of all the posts that have discussed stolen paintings and works of art, art scams, art theft and artist scammers.

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• Chinese Oil Painting Reproductions - My spam folder is kept full each day with at least 400 emails.. day after day.. and among the promises of lengthened manhood and pre-approved loans are emails with titles like "Cheap China Wholesale Paintings" and "Oil Paintings from China."
• Banksy eBay Fraud - Employees of the company that authenticates and publishes Banksy prints "Pictures on Walls" (POW), have been selling unauthorized Banksy prints on eBay.
• Art Forger Taking Advantage of Notoriety - The British artist Robert Thwaites is out of prison and looking to cash in on his new found notoriety as an art forger. Thwaites was sentenced to two years prison after he was charged with forging the work of the 19th century painter of fairies John Anster Fitzgerald.
• The Scream Thieves Jailed - The gang that stole paintings by the Norwegian master, Edvard Munch have been put behind bars. The three art thieves that were convicted received sentences that ranged from 5 and half, through to 9 and a half years each.
• Two Pablo Picasso Paintings Stolen - At least two Pablo Picasso paintings have been stolen from the Paris apartment of the grand-daughter of Picasso, Diana Widmaier-Picasso. The works are estimated to be worth more than $60 million US dollars.
• The Scream Returned - Two years after the daylight robbery of Edvard Munch's "The Scream", the painting has been returned safely. In August 2004 "The Scream" and "Madonna" were stolen by masked gunmen from the Munch Museum in Norway.
• Benvenuto Cellini Renaissance Sculpture - The 10 inch tall gold Benvenuto Cellini Renaissance sculpture that was one of the top 10 most wanted works of art by the FBI has been returned. The thief was an expert in alarms, which helped in the theft. He was also described as a "funny guy" that did not realize that he had taken a Renaissance masterpiece worth an estimated $60 million.
• Top 10 FBI Art Thefts - The FBI have released a top 10 list of art crimes and are seeking the help of the public. They are a list of masterpieces from some of the biggest names in art.
• Looted Picasso - The owner of a 1922 Picasso "Femme en blanc" valued at about $12,000,000 has opted to pay out $6 million to the grandson of a Jewish woman that once owned the painting in 1940. Carlota Landsberg left the painting with a French art dealer while fleeing the Nazis.
• Stolen Masterpieces Reward - There seems to be a lot of art theft talk around lately. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston currently has a $5 million reward up for the return of several important works stolen way back in 1990.
  
• Stolen Munch Paintings - There's either a lot of art thieves in Norway or it's just very cool to have an original Edvard Munch hanging in the living room. Two lithographs and a small watercolor by the Norwegian artist were recently stolen from a luxury hotel but have been recovered after a police raid in Oslo.
• Art Investors Burnt - Amateur investors.. or speculators.. or people with a little extra cash to invest in something different are burning their fingers on art. Companies buying art for clients and renting the works out to institutions, and promising the investor amazing returns each year should be treated with caution.

Posts that have mentioned art scams, and internet artist scammers..

• Art Scam Avoided - I know that most artists that have been online for a while know how to spot an Email art scam, but there's also a lot of trusting artists out there that are still getting scammed.
• Scam Artists - Vu en ville has shared an example of an email from a scam artist trying to scam artists in the comments of the art scammers post here.
• Art Scam Emails - I haven't been getting any of them art scam Emails lately, but I still get Emails and comments from people that have been getting them, so they're still at it.
• Scam Resource for Artists - Bogus Art Fair - It's a pity that resources like Bogus Art Fair are needed, but such is life. Bogus Art Fair is a resource for tracking and warning artists of shipping scams, online pirates, identity theft, phishing, websites with unfair terms, and more.
• Dr Dave Frank - Artist Scammer - Most artists know to avoid these emails, but I still get some people asking if I think the email is legitimate. So I thought I would post the latest request to purchase some of my paintings.
• George Craige Art Scam? - I just received an email from George Craige gcraige108@yahoo.com and just assumed it was a scam (and am still 99.9% sure that it is), but how would he benefit by using a bank transfer for payment?
• eBay Art Fraud - eBay may be a great tool for contemporary painters to sell their work online as the paintings usually only sell for hundreds or perhaps a few thousand at most. So investors can afford to take a risk on the work.
• Art Scams - I haven't been receiving any of them annoying email scams from people in Nigeria, China, or Russia looking to buy art lately, but they're obviously still out there.
• Art Scammers - I noticed that art scammers are even taking the time to give titles to the paintings that they want to steal from you. I received an email from "Precious", traveling from his/her home in the USA to their new Belgium apartment, and they want to purchase artworks.
• Ripping off Artists Online - ArtQuest, an online gallery for artists is warning its members of an increase in scammers trying to rip artists off. Over the past few weeks they have had more than 15 members contact them in regards to scammers. Problems with cashiers checks (cheques), credit cards, and international money orders have been reported.