Spanish police are investigating the disappearance of a tiny Picasso painting that vanished while being transported from Madrid to Granada, according to local media.
Valued at €600,000 ($640,000), the gouache and pencil artwork titled ‘Naturaleza muerta con guitarra’ (Still Life with Guitar), was intended for display at an exhibition organized by the CajaGranada Foundation. However, the piece – created in 1919 and measuring 12.7cm by 9.8cm – never arrived.
Owned by a private collector in Madrid, it was part of a consignment of loaned exhibits that arrived by van on Friday, October 3. While deliveries were unloaded and checked, some packaged works had not been numbered, complicating verification. The following Monday, artworks under video surveillance were unpacked.
“Once the unpacking had been done by the CajaGranada foundation’s own staff, the works were moved to different parts of the exhibition room,” the foundation said. “Mid-morning that day, the exhibition’s curator and the foundation’s head of exhibitions noticed that one work was missing.”
The foundation reported the painting’s disappearance to the police. Spanish media suggest that the van may have stopped overnight near Granada, with two individuals aboard possibly taking turns guarding its valuable cargo.
Born in 1881 in Malaga, Spain, Pablo Picasso’s works have frequently attracted thieves due to their high value. The most costly theft occurred in February 2007, when two Picasso paintings worth around $54 million were stolen from his granddaughter’s home. One of France’s largest ever art robberies involved 118 pieces of his work being stolen from a museum in Avignon in 1976.
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