Stolen $1M Matisse painting finally turns up — 26 years later

A Swedish museum's philosophy to never negotiate with artwork terrorists has paid off: A Henri Matisse painting stolen in 1987 from Stockholm's Museum of Modern Art has been recovered. The thieves who swiped "Le Jardin," now worth nearly $1 million, held it for ransom and tried to secure big bucks for it right after the theft. The museum refused, figuring the painting was too famous to be sold on the open market. The museum's steely-spined staffers proved prescient. When a Polish collector offered to sell the painting to a London dealer last month, a quick database search revealed it to be hot. "No payments were made, no arms were broken" in the process, an art recovery specialist noted. [Source]

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