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Stolen art — BYU searches the world to recover pilfered pieces

Fascinating article, and tragic that after twenty years of searching, they've recovered less than 5% of the missing paintings, with apparently little prospect of recovering more. I was particularly stunned by the one museum's brazenness: "yes it's yours, but you didn't say anything for so long, we're going to keep it now." Who'd have thought that the old playground "Finders keepers, losers weepers" would apply in the professional world.

It seems to me that the real culprits in this case are the people who put Mr. Burnside in the job.

If he was someone hired as a professor of "art history" and manager of the art collection and is now described as someone who, "was in way over his head", I would be finding out who it was that assigned him such important positions of responsibility for which he was so incapable.

Very interesting and shows that greed can change the lives of people for the worse. I'm blad BYU has changed this terrible situation into a positive. Where else in the world could such an embarassment be turned public and have a positive outcome. Lemmon is a hero!

Is art really worth the time and effort, let alone the money?

With all the retired FBI, Secret Service, and CIA agents who are members (of the church), the Church could call some of them on missions to work on a team specifically to recover the stolen art, and for that matter, any other such legal needs the Church may have.

God gave these men and women experiences and talents that can now be used for the benefit of the Church. Just like retired doctors are called on health missions, and retired lawyers are called on missions for the Church's legal needs, these retired agents could be called on to use their talents to help the Church.

Your idea is great. Present it to someone who could actually implement it.Good going!!!!!!!!!!

I took a class from Brother Burnside at 7:00 in the morning in the lower campus main building. It was hard to stay awake while watching his slide shows. However, as mentioned in this article, I think that he was a good person dedicated to BYU. My understanding was that many of the painting had been loaned to departments around campus and hung on the wall of professors for such a long time that when they retired they ended up taking the paintings thinking they had ownership. Since this was not mentioned in this article was it not true and/or are you protecting the memory of many retired professors?

Is recovering the art worth the time, effort, and money?

Yes. Yes it is.

I visit the Met more than I visit Utah. This news that they've kept artwork from a small collection owned by a University is disturbing. The Met would not stand for this if the case was reversed. Any other claim of abandonment would be laughable. To expect curator/owners to stay current on all art sales around the world during it's unknown loss is ridiculous. The Met decides on what time table you are permitted to discover your loss and on what agenda you are expected to discover it's location? Small museums, who are not agressively seeking new acquitions, do not have the staff to search the auctions and art galleries around the world looking for art that may belong to them in the chance that it may have been stolen without their knowledge. The Met in their leadership position should relinquish the art. In addition they should provide training/support to small collections to improve their forgery and loss detection capabilities. Why did The Met not know the art was already owned prior to their acquisition? Art has been cataloged and documented for centuries. The Met is simply arrogant here. I bet the court case was in NYC.

As far as the stolen painting in the Scarsdale, NY home, why not get some people out with picket signs "Stolen Artwork Inside", etc & picket the creep? Bet they won't like THAT publicity around their country club!

I took art classes and volunteered to help catalog and store the art collection at BYU 40 years ago. It was a hopeless task, no one really cared. The huge Young collection had overwhelmed the facilities and staff. Art was put on racks in hallways, stacked in unlocked storerooms with wide open doors. Professors and other people took art in and out with no controls whatsoever. Paintings hung unsecured on walls in offices, classrooms and halls all over campus. I complained about the lack of security but it fell on deaf ears. With thousands of valuable pieces of art just laying around unsecured, it doesn't surprise me that a lot of them were stolen. I'd suspect that students and others around the University just took art home and possibly have valuable paintings hanging on their walls to this day. Students and even most Professors and school employees had no idea the paintings had much of any value. What BYU should do is send a letter and list of missing art to every student, prof and employee from around the time the works went missing and ask to have them returned. I bet some would come back.

It seems that BYU should be equally to blame for being so negligent in it's stewardship of the art in the first place. They must share the blame for the conditions that allowed this to happen.

The largest art heist in the world happened just a few years ago in Boston at the Gardner museum. Doors down from Harvard Medical school, practically accross the street from the Boston Museum of Art. There were a couple of security guards and no security system. I took some curators classes at Harvard and they have improper storage, mildew problems and other such issues as well. They are doing the best they can with the resources they have, but if there are current issues as these world class institutions then don't be so hard on your local university for improper care decades ago. Stella, surely you remember the Gardner museum heist when it hit the news. They've never recovered the art. The bottom line is they are trying to right the wrongs now and to have a major institution and others be uncooperative is unfathamable in my mind.

Of course BYU is to blame, that's why they didn't try to cover it up and are now trying to correct the mistake they made. This isn't a story on who's to blame, it outlined what happened and the current process of recovery. But what's worse is the Met's refusal of cooperations, especially when it knows it's harboring stolen artwork.

I purchase large amounts of artwork for collections around the world. BYU is reknown for being cheap, they want you to "donate it" or use it for tithes. worse yet, the art will hardly ever or never be seen again. BYU is hoarding what should be seen by everyone. Why not put it all in a museum or a display for everyone to enjoy?

This is a fascinating, well-written article. I would think the first step in detective work on this issue would be to contact/investigate BYU employees who may have inadvertently, ignorantly, or intentionally taken one of these works home. It would be great if family members of BYU employees from this period would take a careful look at any of their art treasures/keepsakes (or even what they may consider trash)and contact the "Y" if they are unsure of actual ownership. Hopefully this article will initiate some long-awaited action.

Missionaries are supposed to be out doing the Lord's work. I don't think the Lord really cares about lost art pieces, just lost souls.

When I was a student at BYU, there was a double bust in the Harris Fine Arts Center to honor the 100th wedding anniversary of a couple named Peterson, grandparents of one of the university deans. When I returned for a campus visit several years later, the HFAC no longer exhibited the bust, and no one seemed to know where it was. I wonder whether it is also among the missing items.

I find this article fasinating for a couple reasons. It is very descriptive and a lot of research seems to have been done by the writer. I especially enjoyed reading about Lt. Lemmon's work. He has given a lot of time and talent to the case and BYU should be proud of the investment they have made in Lt. Lemmon. He is the best thing that has come along in this situation. Did I also mention how handsome he is - and that he is my dad -and I will forever be grateful for the appreciation and knowledge of fine art he gave me!!

I was a student at BYU in the 70's, majoring in art. I had several classes from Wes Burnside. I was asked to come to his office. Some extremely inappropriate actions took place. When reported to BYU, I was told to not tell anyone and it would be taken care of. Today this would not be tolerated! If timely investigations had been done, perhaps some of these later allegations would not have happened.