The National Police has found and identified Pablo Picasso’s painting in Madrid Still life with guitar, that, when it should have been transferred from the capital to Granada to be part of an exhibition. As reported in a statement, the painting never got onto the transport truck. Sources close to the investigation have confirmed to the Efe agency that the painting “did not even leave the building from where it was going to be loaded to be displayed in Granada.” According to these sources, a transport company had to pick it up from a building on Pío Days later, the woman’s husband told her the news of the disappearance of the work and it occurred to her to check the box, which she had left in a corner. Upon realizing that it was indeed the picasso disappeared, the couple called the police.
The Historical Heritage Brigade keeps the investigation open, “once the Scientific Police specialists have carried out the inspection of the package in which the recovered work was found,” according to the statement from the National Police.
Since , responsible for the exhibition in which the work was to be exhibited, they have declined to make statements to EL PAÍS about the discovery because they are a party involved in the lawsuit. However, they confirm that the rest of the pieces are on display and that, once the police investigations are concluded, they would like to incorporate the painting into the exhibition.
The only information that is known, delivered by the Police this Friday morning, is that the packaging and other circumstances led to suspicion that the work could be the picasso that was wanted weeks ago, a small gouache and lead lead on paper, measuring 12.7 x 9.8 centimeters, something like the size of half a page, framed and insured for 600,000 euros. The piece, a minor painting by the artist, was sold a few years ago by , which specializes in the sale of works by Picasso, for 60,000 euros.
The Police had been investigating the disappearance since October 10, when the CajaGranada Foundation formalized the complaint after verifying that the painting had not arrived, along with 56 other works that were moved from Madrid, to the cultural center where it was to be exhibited.
Still life with guitarfrom 1919, had been stored along with the rest of the works on September 25 to travel to the CajaGranada Cultural Center, where they would be part of the exhibition Still life. The eternity of the inert since October 6. In a statement, the institution explained that on October 3, the transportation company appeared at the cultural center facilities to deliver the pieces, which was carried out with video surveillance. As there were more than 50 pieces and “as not all the packaging was properly numbered, it was not possible to do an exhaustive check without unpacking,” so certain checks were made and it was agreed to sign the consignment notes. The unpacking was pending on the 6th, where they checked exactly piece by piece, as explained by the entity. It was at that moment when the lack of one of the works was detected, they reported it and the Police began the investigations to find out at what point in the transfer it disappeared, how and why, which is still not clear. Shortly thereafter, the painting was registered in Interpol’s international database of stolen and missing art objects, which contains descriptions and images of more than 57,000 items.
