Art thief leads police to buried £37m salt cellar

[Merlion]

I don't even know this very beautiful gold sculpture by Cellini was stolen. Anyway, I am glad they have now found it.

Art thief leads police to buried £37m salt cellar

A THREE-YEAR hunt for a stolen £37m Renaissance salt cellar dubbed the “Mona Lisa of sculptures” came to an end yesterday when the suspected thief led Austrian police to his buried treasure.

The world’s most expensive salt cellar, called the Saliera and crafted by Benvenuto Cellini between 1540 and 1543, was found undamaged in a wooden case in a forest outside Zwettl, the suspect’s home town 55 miles north of Vienna. ....

The 10in high gold and encrusted enamel sculpture of figures representing the sea and the earth was created for King Francis I of France. The small vessel designed to hold salt rests between the two figures.

Cellini boasted in his autobiography that when the king caught sight of the Saliera “he uttered a loud outcry of astonishment and could not satiate his eyes with gazing at it”.

The Florentine master’s only surviving work in gold was stolen from Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum on the night of May 11, 2003. ....

To see the full Times article, click here (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2004591,00.html).

A more interesting news article, with news worthy photo of the sculpture can be found here (http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/sculpture-found-in-snow/2006/01/23/1137864832642.html).

To see this sculpture and find out more about it, click here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saliera).

[JAZ]

I wonder what the thief of this incredible, rare object could possibly have planned to do with it? How could he have sold it considering its notoriety? The workmanship is exquisite, though it is mind boggling that such an ornate and delicately worked thing could ever have been designed to hold salt, of all things.
JAZ

[Julianna]

I wonder what the thief of this incredible, rare object could possibly have planned to do with it?

I always wonder that too when I read about all of these pieces of art (e.g. The Scream) being stolen. Is there really someone stupid enough to buy (or sell?) stolen art?

[Merlion]

I wonder what the thief of this incredible, rare object could possibly have planned to do with it? How could he have sold it considering its notoriety?

I read a news report that the theft of this Cellini valuable salt cellar was not planned.

The thief walked past the museum one night when he was drunk. He saw the scaffolding outside and one window not armed with security device. So on impulse he broke in, and took the salt cellar without knowing how valuable it was.

Apparently the museum again is very much to be blamed. But perhaps after this event and its world-wide publicity, it may end up getting more visitors. :)

[ironman]

Hi, Can you believe that even in his drunken stupor he had the great taste and discernment to take such a beautiful object. Imagine what he would have taken if he was sober?

A DRINK!
Have a nice day,
Jeff

[sculptor]

Good taste indeed......
in this drunken thief, we find a real "art critic"

I love the way she carresses/teases neptune with her outstretched foot,
(reminds me of playing footsie with my first love.......(sigh) oh to be young again and drifting, light headed and light hearted, in the bloom of the awakening passions)

a gentle caress
the land in a fertile embrace with the sea

I love cellini's work
his staging
his compositions
his emulating of the masters who preceeded him, then taking the art one step beyond
In the frieze of the salt cellar, he borrowed day night dawn and evening from michaelangelo

his Perseus gathers the gazes from michaelangelo's stone david and bachio bandinelli's stone hercules
and directs them down to the body of the medusa without giving anything in return save for the severed head which turns those who gaze upon it into stone.......even a david or a hercules

Bienvenuto "you are welcome" indeed
And
We should all welcome back one of his labors. Especially this which was one of his finest transition from goldsmith to sculptor pieces.

Thanx for the posting Merlion

sculptor (http://home.mindspring.com/~mandali/index.html)

[Landseer]

Wow, it was buried in a box in the woods, imagine how long it might have stayed there and imagine someone finding it and figuring it was just some ceramic flea market item.
Makes one wonder how many other such items lay buried just inches below the dirt in places people walk by them every day totally unaware.