A Rembrandt self-portrait stolen from Stockholm’s Nationalmuseum in 2000 was recovered in a 2005 undercover operation, according to the FBI. The portrait makes the loss personal: viewers meet the artist’s own image rather than only a scene he chose to paint.
We put that combination of cultural intimacy and international recovery above Amsterdam, despite its shorter absence. Frankfurt ranks higher for the loss of a paired Turner display. Compare the shadowed face with the small scale of the image: importance is not a measure of canvas size.
Source: FBI.
Image: Rembrandt · Public domain. Resized and recompressed; original rights retained.
