A $5 million Joseph Bacon painting stolen in 2015 has been found in Spain

A painting by Francis Bacon worth 5 million euros has been found in Madrid, along with four other paintings by the British artist stolen from a private home nine years ago, Spanish police announced Thursday.

• Read more: In New York, a portrait of Bacon sold for 25.7 million euros at an art auction.

This painting is part of a collection of portraits of the Spanish banker José Capello painted by the artist. They were stolen from the Madrid owner’s apartment in the summer of 2015, while the latter was in London.

The theft was considered one of the most significant thefts of contemporary art in Spain at the time, with the total value of the five paintings estimated at 25 million euros. The criminals also took away a safe and jewellery.

Three of the five paintings were discovered in 2017. Spanish police announced several arrests during the investigations, noting that investigations into the last two paintings were ongoing.

According to police, that led to the arrest of two new people in Madrid in February, who are suspected of having the last two paintings in their possession. “Following these arrests,” one of these two paintings was “located in a building in Madrid,” he explained in a press release.

In total, since the investigation began in 2015, “sixteen people suspected of involvement in the theft have been arrested,” including the sponsor and his “subject offenders,” police write, adding that they are continuing their investigation. Find the fifth and final stolen work.

Police have not released further details on who was involved in the robbery or how they were identified.

According to a daily article Country Published in 2017, the sponsor is a Madrid art dealer. His trail would have been traced thanks to another art dealer who had sent photographs of the stolen paintings for sale.

Francis Bacon, born in 1909, is best known for his triptychs, one of which, “Three Studies of Lucian Freud,” sold for $142.4 million at Christie’s in New York in 2013, becoming the most expensive work of art at the time. the world

The British painter, who was interested in the great Spanish masters Goya and Velázquez, died in the Spanish capital in 1992.