Painting Stolen 60 Years Ago Returned to N.Y. Gallery After Turning up in U.K. Sale

'Flower Market Madeleine' by Edouard-Leon Cortés has been recovered and returned to the Arnot Gallery in New York City

Sixty years after it was stolen, a painting by Edouard-Leon Cortés was recovered in the United Kingdom and returned to an art gallery in New York City.

Titled Flower Market Madeleine, the painting was one of more than 3,000 pieces stolen from the Herbert Arnot Gallery in N.Y.C. in the 1950s and ‘60s, according to a press release from Art Recovery International, which recovered the artwork.

Carnes Fine Art, a dealer in England, purchased the painting in November 2022 at an auction outside of Manchester and was preparing to sell it this year. According to Art Recovery International founder Christopher A. Marinello, the dealer was “doing some due diligence” on the piece and that is how it was discovered to be one of the paintings that went missing from the Arnot Gallery. 

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Recovering the painting was a months-long process, according to Marinello, involving everyone who had bought and sold the painting since its disappearance. In a press release, Marinello said, “We are very grateful to Bradley Carnes, Capes Dunn, and their vendor for releasing this stolen painting unconditionally to the Arnot Gallery.:

He added, "While in this instance, we were able to convince many of the parties to reimburse the other, eventually there will be those who are out of luck. I cannot stress enough the importance of performing due diligence and authentication checks which would have uncovered this stolen painting decades earlier."

Flower Market Madeleine has since been returned to the NYC gallery.

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Per the release, Cortés’ painting was sold along with more than 3,000 others by Louis Edelman, the Arnot Gallery’s then-manager who had opened his own gallery in 1966. As part of his business, he was selling the Arnot Gallery’s pieces and profiting himself.

He was eventually arrested in Chicago, convicted for transporting stolen artwork across state lines. Fined $10,000 and spent two years in prison, according to Art Recovery International. However, the paintings he had stolen and sold remained missing and have since cropped up around the world in galleries and at auction houses.

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Paintings by Cortés and fellow French painter Antoine Blanchard have been particularly prevalent in the search, per Marinello. He said in a statement, “Anyone buying or selling a painting by Edouard-Leon Cortés or Antoine Blanchard is advised to check with the Arnot Gallery for proper authentication.”

He added, “We have been recovering one or two pictures per year from this 60-year-old theft and we’re never going to give up until every last one is returned.”

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