Caravaggio's "Taking of Christ" Was Stolen from Museum in Odessa

Saturday, 02 August 2008 00:35

OSESSA, UKRAINE - Art officials in Ukraine are bemoaning the theft of a Caravaggio painting this week. The chiaroscuro work, alternately known as The Taking of Christ and The Kiss of Judas, was stolen some time between Tuesday night and early Thursday morning from a museum in Odessa. Authorities believe that the thief or thieves bypassed the outdated alarm system by removing panes of glass to enter the facility.

Caravaggio’s Taking of Christ, or the Kiss of Judas was stolen from the Museum of Western and Eastern Art in the Black Sea port of Odessa. Museum staff found that the work was missing from its frame. The thieves cut it from its frame. The museum was closed on the previous day, so the thieves could have stolen it from Tuesday evening. According to police, the thieves entered the museum through a window and bypassed the alarm system by removing a window pane instead of breaking it. After taking the work from its frame, the thieves fled through the roof.

Vitaly Abramov, deputy head of the Odessa Art Museum, said, “This is a cultural catastrophe, a national tragedy. There is so little of art of such level in the former Soviet Union. You cannot put a price on this and I am not talking about money here. It is, in every sense, priceless.”

Lyudmila Saulenko, the museum’s deputy director stated, "We came in here to find that the wind was blowing the blinds around through a window with no pane." Lyudmila Saulenko, the museum's deputy director told reporters

According to a report from Reuters, museum staffers arrived at work on Thursday to discover the late-16th century painting had been removed from its frame. The museum was closed on Wednesday, so it is unknown exactly when the robbery took place. Vitaly Abramov, an executive at another Odessa art museum, called the theft "a cultural catastrophe" and "a national tragedy."

The value of the painting is unknown, however a version of the same artwork hangs in the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin.

Though the authenticity of the painting has been questioned (it was considered a version by a student of Caravaggio's), a Soviet art expert declared in 1950 that the work was indeed one by the Italian Baroque master, and put the value in excess of $100 Million US Dollars.

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