Brazilian Police Recover Eight Stolen Matisse 'Jazz' Prints Worth $193,000

Henri Matisse's (1869–1954) "Jazz" series ranks among the French artist's most celebrated creations, a set of plates produced using the cut-paper technique he perfected late in life. Published in 1947, the vividly colored suite of prints continues to circulate through public and private collections worldwide, making it a recurring target for art theft.

According to Brazilian authorities, eight plates from the series were stolen from a São Paulo public library while it was open to visitors. The total value of the stolen works is estimated at $193,000. São Paulo's civil police announced this week that all of the missing pieces had been recovered and that one suspect had been arrested in connection with the theft.

The fact that the theft occurred in broad daylight, inside a publicly accessible institution, underscores how vulnerable many cultural venues remain to this kind of crime—particularly when the works on display are small-format prints, which are far easier to conceal than large paintings. "Jazz" plates, produced in limited runs but reproduced across multiple copies, are commonly held in library and museum collections around the world, explaining their presence in a Brazilian institution.

The recovery follows a string of similar cases reported recently, notably in Europe, where several works attributed to Matisse, Cézanne, and Renoir have likewise been recovered by law enforcement after being stolen. Brazilian investigators have not said whether the São Paulo case may be linked to a broader art-trafficking network, nor have they released further details about the arrested suspect's identity or motive.

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Written by the ADM desk based on ARTnews. Read the original article for the full story.