Two men arrested earlier this week in connection with the theft of a lithograph by famed Norwegian artist Edvard Munch were ordered held in custody for at least four weeks while police continue to investigate. The lithograph has also been recovered.
Newspaper Aftenposten reported Wednesday that both suspects are charged with possession of stolen property. It’s believed that the men, a 38-year-old man from Oslo and a 55-year-old man from Vestfold, were both in possession of the lithograph, Historien from 1914, at various times.
It was stolen after the windows of a gallery in Oslo were smashed in 2009. Police wouldn’t say where or how they found the lithograph, considered to be one of Munch’s central works.
The gallery, Pascal Nyborg, has since gone out of business but its owner told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) it was “fantastic” that investigators from the Oslo Police District’s organized crime division had recovered the lithograph, valued at around NOK 2 million.
“The case had been dropped, and I think it’s fantastic that the art was recovered anyway,” Nyborg, who now works for the Oslo art auction house Christiania Auksjonsforretning, told NRK.
newsinenglish.no staff
