An armed robbery on Sunday (7 December) at a library in São Paulo has raised questions about the security of public art collections in Brazil. During public visiting hours, two gunmen entered the Biblioteca Mário de Andrade (BMA) in downtown São Paulo and stole 13 works: eight engravings by Henri Matisse and five works by Candido Portinari.
The BMA was hosting the exhibition Do livro ao museu (From the Book to the Museum) in collaboration with the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo (MAM-SP). The show explored the intersection between literature and art, and museums and libraries, featuring Modernist prints and editions from the 1940s and 50s that aimed to highlight how each has informed the other in Brazil. The robbery occurred on the exhibition's final day.
The thieves entered through the main entrance shortly after the library opened and subdued a security guard and an elderly couple before breaking a glass display case and exiting with the works in a canvas bag. Security personnel quickly alerted police, who could not immediately locate the suspects. The BMA has handed over surveillance footage in hopes of finding the suspects, who were seen entering a van.
The São Paulo police claims one of the suspects has been identified so far. It is speculated that the theft was commissioned by an art trafficking network, with authorities releasing the titles of the artworks to prevent them from being sold. The robbers’ getaway vehicle has also been seized and is undergoing forensic examination.
The secretariat of culture issued a statement that reads in part: “The department reports that the exhibited works have a valid insurance policy and that the location has a security team and a security camera system. All material that may be useful for the investigation is being provided to the police authorities. The military police responded to the incident and the municipal civil guard reinforced policing.”
The exterior of the Biblioteca Mário de Andrade, which was robbed of 13 works on 7 December Photo by Wilfredor, via Wikimedia Commons
Efforts to recover the works are ongoing. The works are unlikely to enter the commercial market due to their rarity and the global attention to the theft. Interpol and other agencies have been alerted of the works to prevent them from being moved.
The robbers targeted some of the most valuable works on display, including five prints from Portinari’s series for Menino de Engenho (Sugarcane Boy), which references the 1932 book by José Lins do Rego, a classic of Brazilian literature dealing with racial inequality and the realities of the sugar economy. The works were included in a special edition of the book published in 1943.
The Matisse works are collages from his limited-edition 1947 book Jazz, including: Le clown, Le cirque, Monsieur loyal, Cauchemar de l'Eléphant Blanc, Le Codomas, La nageuse dans l'aquarium, L'avaleur de sabres and Le Cowboy. Only 300 editions were printed, and the works are widely recognised as textbook examples of Matisse’s cut-paper collage technique.
The theft comes less than two months after the robbery at the Musée du Louvre in Paris, where robbers stole more than $102m worth of Napoleonic-era crown jewels, underscoring the risks public institutions face in safeguarding art and heritage objects. The BMA and the MAM-SP have not released statements on the robbery.
