Theft at the Museum of Fine Arts Confirmed

They say that in a humble Russian museum when visitors arrived they got surprised by the empty spaces on the walls, but they kept the captions. When asked, museum guides used to answer them “they were paintings looted during the French invasion last century.” Shortly after, in Czechoslovakia, a small town museum used the same argument, but the answer was different, “this work is now in a Soviet museum.”

The National Council of Cultural Heritage of Cuba has confirmed the theft of artworks from the “Antonio Rodríguez Morey”socio- administrative building belonging to the National Museum of Fine Arts. Although the amount is unknown, the works, according to the note, belong to the pre-vanguard movement, to the turn of the century, marked by the struggle between the academic and trends of modernity.

The list of stolen works has not made public, although it is known that the method consisted of cutting canvases and stacking the frames so the shortfall would not be noticed.

The international art market is highly protected against theft and illegal trafficking of artwork. If any of these fall into the established circuit it should return to Cuba without any problems, but if it falls into the hands of private collectors their destination is another: decorate the walls of art connoisseurs.

Cuban art of the end of the century is characterized by its exponents owing to an apprenticeship program starring Manuel Melero, first Cuban painter who led the Academy of Fine Arts of San Alejandro. The main exponents of this school were Armando G. Menocal , Rafael Blanco and Leopoldo Romañach , among others.

The pictorial heritage is a common value that must be preserved and protected. In any theft, and one like this manifests indolence and carelessness, and there is no other justification. Hopefully at the end we will not listen to the gray voice of a guide describing the empty space on a wall.