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NEWARK A Goya painting stolen from a parked truck in Pennsylvania while en route to the Guggenheim Museum two weeks ago has been recovered undamaged in central New Jersey, the FBI announced Monday.
Agents from the Newark Field Office's Violent Crimes/Interstate Theft Task Force recovered the 1778 painting "Children With a Cart," which had been insured by its owner, the Toledo Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio, for $1 million.
A reward of up to $50,000 was offered by an insurance firm for information leading to the recovery of the painting following its Nov. 8 theft after leaving Ohio. Extensive media coverage helped bring FBI investigators that information, the bureau said, and the painting was recovered by Saturday morning.
The FBI said no arrests have been made, but wouldn't provide any further details about the recovery, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation.
Francisco de Goya y Lucientes painted the oil in 1778. It was to be included in the exhibition "Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth, and History," which opened at the Guggenheim in Manhattan on Friday.
At the time of the theft, the crated painting was in the care of a professional art transporter.
Steven Siegel, a spokesman for the Newark FBI office, said the thief or thieves did not appear to know what was inside the truck when they broke into it in a hotel parking lot in Stroudsburg, Pa. "There's no indication they had any knowledge beforehand" of what was inside, he said. "It was a target of opportunity. They probably thought it was a truck full of PlayStations."
The painting, which depicts four children playing with a flute, drum, and cart under a tree, was one of Goya's earlier works. It'd be "virtually impossible to sell and therefore has no value on the open market," according to the Toledo museum.
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