It's been a funny old day in the world of art. First the Kunsthall Museum in Rotterdam reported the theft, in the early hours of Tuesday morning of a number of works of art including a Picasso, a Matisse and two Monet's. The police were on the scene within 5 minutes of the alarm sounding but there was no sign of the paintings or the intruders. Then it's announced from the USA that a Roy Lichtenstein painting, 'Electric Chord', that went missing after it was delivered to an art restorer in 1970 has turned up in a warehouse in New York. And that raises the question 'Why are major works of art stolen?' It's not as if they can be easily sold or disposed of. Presumably there is some kind of a market for these treasures, perhaps they are stolen to order by collectors but why? Once it's in your possession you can hardly put it on your dining room wall to show to your friends as they might just be a tad suspicious. In this case for example the theft included Monet's 'Waterloo Bridge, London,' a pretty well known piece that would be spotted a mile off. So instead do these 'collectors' hoard them in their cellars delighting merely in the fact they now 'own' them? Whatever the reason it's suprising the number that turn up years later in obscure places such as Lichtenstein's in a warehouse where presumably it was dumped when either the thief or the current owner got fed up with it and simply disposed of it as best they could. I guess the only saving grace is that they do tend to get left to be found and not burn't or otherwise destroyed in an attempt to cover the perpetrator's footsteps!