Art theft. This short phrase conjures images of sexy art heist movies like The Thomas Crown Affair (both the 1968 and 1999 versions) and Entrapment (1999). In reality, most thefts of valuable art are not nearly so fraught with intrigue. In fact, most that I have read about seem to be quite unexceptional in their execution, though, I have noticed that most published accounts about the thefts themselves seem to be very light on details, as if the museums and galleries, and the law enforcement agencies involved, don’t want to be too forthcoming, in case it gives people ideas.

I like and enjoy art. I have always had an interest in it, and I have viewed a few “famous” pieces of art by famous artists in person; including works by Renoir, Monet, Van Gogh, Singer Sargent, Cezanne and Georges Seurat. They are quite remarkable to be seen in person. Photos do not do them justice.

Occasionally I find that some of my interests collide and intermingle. I have also always liked mysteries, and at one point in my life, my interest in art and unresolved mysteries led to me to read about one of the most famous art heists, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft of 1990. You can read about it here ; it is still unsolved and the works that were stolen have not yet been recovered.

When I discovered that Wikipedia has a category list of stolen art works I found myself gleefully clicking on the links, astonished both by the temerity of the thieves and how many of the stolen pieces were taken from a gallery ( and even a museum) by someone who evidently just grabbed it off a wall and walked out with it.

Some of the art thefts that I read about I was already familiar with ( like the theft of the Mona Lisa in 1911) and the 1997 theft of a Gustav Klimt painting that turned up 23 years later in 2019, found in a hidden exterior wall niche after a gardener cut back some overgrown ivy on the grounds of the museum from which it had been stolen. A surprising amount of thefts were thefts of outdoor sculptures, many of them quite large. Many of them were assumed to have been stolen to be melted down for scrap metal and were never recovered, which seemed quite sad, given that sculpted works are very time consuming to make and are often given for the purpose of memorializing a person, an event or are intended as a gift to the community at large. It seems so deplorable that these art works were viewed simply as scrap metal and were treated as nothing; defiling the giving spirit with which they were created.

One art theft that I was not familiar with is the actual subject of this post ( which I am now finally getting to the point of– at last!); the theft of a Renoir that was missing for 61 years. While the case is not absolutely or technically unresolved, there are still elements of the case that are not known, thus the mystery. I also found the story quite fascinating because of the peculiar behavior of the woman who had the painting, a woman who was at first only known as “Renoir Girl”. She was a former physical education teacher from Virginia whose somewhat astonishing story of how she came to have the painting seemed to guarantee a publicity that one would expect she should have realized would bring unwelcome scrutiny. This scrutiny ultimately led to the discovery of the likely unsavory means in which the painting came to her possession and also to her losing her claim on ownership.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir ( b.1841–d. 1919) was a French artist who was a leading painter in the Impressionist style, along with other well-known artists like Claude Monet, whom he was acquainted with. Known for his vibrant lighting and saturated colors in his works, Renoir focused on people in intimate and candid compositions, but he also painted many landscapes. I had the pleasure of viewing some of Renoir’s works in person at the Art Institute of Chicago, including Two Sisters (On the Terrace).

In 1879, Renoir painted an oil on linen landscape that was called Paysage Bords de Seine (On the Shore of the Seine). It was a small painting, only measuring 9 x 5.5 inches. In 1925 it was purchased by the oldest art gallery in Paris, Bernheim-Jeune, and a year later sold to a wealthy American by the name of Herbert L. May and his wife, Saidie Adler May. Herbert and Saidie later divorced, but Saidie, who was an avid art collector, kept this painting with her extensive collection until 1937, when she loaned it to the Baltimore Museum of Art, to whom she had always been a major benefactor. In her will, she bequeathed much of her collection, including Paysage Bords de Seine, to the Baltimore Museum. The painting remained on loan for the next fourteen years, until Saidie died in May, 1951.

Months after Saidie May died in May 1951, sometime between the evening of November 16, 1951 and noon on the 17th, the painting was stolen from the Baltimore Museum of Art during a special exhibit. The museum reported the theft, but apparently had no suspects and no idea who had taken it. The museum was paid $2,500 for the loss by their insurance company and for the next 61 years the painting’s whereabouts remained unknown and, it seems, forgotten about.

Fast forward to September 2012. A former phy ed teacher by the name of Marcia “Martha” Fuqua brought the painting to the Potomack Company, an auction house in Alexandria, Virginia with the intention to sell it. Martha claimed she had bought the painting at a flea market for $7 in 2009, as part of a box of miscellaneous kitsch that included a plastic cow and a Paul Bunyon doll. As this sensational story began to spread in the news and was even discussed on the TV program, Good Morning, America, the Potomack Company was contacted by an alert Washington Post reporter, who had found documents in the BMA’s library listing the Renoir as having been stolen in 1951 and found the insurance claim for the theft ( the original police report was also located at a later date). The auction house was floored. As part of their due diligence prior to auctioning the painting, they had verified it’s authenticity as a Renoir and contacted Bernheim-Jeune in Paris and had learned of the painting’s purchase by Saidie May in 1925 and that it was loaned to the BMA in 1937, but that was where all known records for the painting ended, and for some unknown reason, the theft of the painting was not included on the Art Loss Register, the world’s largest private database of lost and stolen artworks, so the Potomack Co. had no reason to believe the painting was stolen until the call from the Post reporter, who discovered the insurance claim and the report in archived records.

It seems that the painting, along with most of Saidie May’s art collection, was left to the museum in her will and because she had died only six months prior to the painting being stolen, her estate had not yet been closed, and it wasn’t until early 1952 that ownership of her art collection was formally transferred to the Baltimore Museum, so in effect, when the painting was stolen, it was still technically “on loan”, which could account for why it never was on the Art Loss Register and it seems to have slipped through the cracks so to speak. The Potomack Company promptly canceled the planned auction, alerted the FBI, and the painting was confiscated until the FBI could investigate. The statute of limitations for the theft had long since passed, but as a stolen art work, who would be the legal owner would have to be determined by the courts and the FBI’s investigation over the next 14 months would play a key part in that determination.

Martha Fuqua, who had been using the alias “Renoir Girl” in all press reports up until that point to protect her identity, now was revealed in court documents. She was from Fairfax County, Virginia and had once been a teacher, though she was laid off in 2009. She had a history of financial issues, at one point filing for bankruptcy citing debts of more than $400,000. Eventually, she worked as a blackjack dealer, and then ran a driving school. She was once engaged to a chef and owner of a local French restaurant, but when the couple split, she tried to sue the restaurant in 2003, alleging that she worked at the restaurant as a manager but was never paid. Her ex-fiance produced records of all the paychecks she received and her case was dismissed. In 2012 Martha brought a Renoir to the Potomack Company, claiming she had bought it two years earlier at a flea market and it had been sitting in a shed at her home , almost forgotten, until her mother urged her to have it authenticated. Once it was learned that the painting was a stolen art work, Martha claimed that she had no idea, that it was solely by chance she had come upon it, that she also had no knowledge of art or art history and that she was the painting’s “innocent owner”, however, her story started to quickly unravel.

Following the reveal of Martha’s identity, the FBI soon heard from numerous acquaintances, and also her own brother, Matt, that the painting had been known to be in their mother’s home for decades, and that Martha had more of a knowledge of art than she let on. Their mother, Marcia, ( who went by the last name “Fouquet” professionally), was a painter herself, and earned a fine arts degree from Goucher College in 1952 and a master’s from Maryland Institute College of Art in 1957. She also analyzed a Renoir painting in her master’s thesis. Marcia Fouquet ran an art studio for adults and children in her home for more than two decades and Martha helped at the studio for many years. Her presence there was recollected by many friends, colleagues and former students of the art studio.

One of Marcia’s specialties was reproducing the pieces of famous artists, including Renoir, according to people who knew her, and her online biography. Matt Fuqua initially told reporters and investigators that his mother had owned the Renoir at least “50-60 years”. Other people who knew the family and had visited there also said they had seen the painting in the mother’s art studio as far back as the 1980s and 1990s. Some reported they did not specifically remember what the painting depicted, but all of them recalled the ornate gold frame with a plaque that said “Renoir” and the small size. Some visitors reported that Marcia Fouquet deliberately showed them the painting and showed it off, even telling them it was a ‘real Renoir’, however, almost everyone she told this to did not believe her and thought she was lying and never took her seriously. In one case, she told a friend the painting was a “family heirloom” and that it could “never leave the family” and that she had bought it from an art dealer.

Matt Fuqua’s recollection of how his sister came into possession of the painting is also quite different than Martha’s story. He testified that she did not buy it at a flea market, but that the painting had been in their mother’s art studio for decades and then, in late 2011, less than a year before his sister took it to the Potomack Company to try and sell it, he and his girlfriend, Jamie, were cleaning out his mother’s art studio and Jamie came across the painting stored in a box. She liked the pretty frame and was intrigued that it had a plaque that said “Renoir”. She set it aside and shortly after, when Marcia Fouquet came to check their progress she told Jamie that it was a real Renoir and it was ‘priceless’. Hours later, Martha showed up and spotted the painting and instructed Jamie to call her if she “came across anything else like that in her mother’s studio”. She told Jamie the painting was “worth $1 million” and that her mother was giving it to her to “hold for safekeeping” and she subsequently took the painting away with her.

Months later ,in July 2012, Martha went secretly to an auction house called Quinn’s Auction Galleries with the painting. She made no mention of finding it at a flea market, but claimed she bought it at an estate sale. The auction house became suspicious of her story, however, and when they told her they would need to authenticate the Renoir, Martha questioned why that would be necessary. When they asked her to leave the painting with them for more research, she refused. An appointment was made for her to discuss the process with the company’s vice-president, but she never showed and phone calls made to her were unanswered and unreturned. Shortly after this she approached the Potomack Company to sell the painting with the flea market story.

After a period of investigation by the FBI , the case for ownership came onto the court docket in late 2013. There was too much evidence showing that Martha Fuqua’s stories were fabricated, so in January 2014, ownership was awarded to the Baltimore Museum of Art, as per Saidie May’s original will, and the painting was returned to the museum . Marcia Fouquet had passed away in September 2013 from cancer, age 84. Questions about where she had gotten the painting were left unanswered and if her daughter knew, she wasn’t saying. Matt Fuqua and his sister had become estranged by this time. Martha had been arrested for burglary in October 2013 for allegedly breaking into Matt’s girlfriend’s apartment and allegedly stealing jewelry, furniture and antiques. She then tried to sue her brother and his girlfriend and have them evicted from their apartment, which was on their mother’s home’s property. Matt claimed in his depositions that his mother had told Martha, when the news broke about the painting being stolen, that she should return the painting to the “rightful owners” ( the museum) so that “all of this goes away” instead of trying to claim ownership. Such a comment seems to imply that she may have known all along she was not the “rightful” owner. In March 2014 the painting was put on exhibition at the BMA, 63 years after it was stolen.

So really the only mystery now is —who stole the painting? And did Marcia and, by extension, her daughter, Martha, know it was stolen all those years she had it hanging in her art studio? They both seemed to know it was a real Renoir. Marcia was never forthcoming about where it had come from. Most of the people who were told it was real thought she was lying, and didn’t ask where she had gotten it. When asked by her son, shortly before she died, where she got it, she wouldn’t answer. At least one person was told by her, years earlier, that it was purchased in a collection from an art dealer, but if that was the case, there would have been a record of it’s sale and there was no such record, which she must have known. Another man, whom Marcia dated in the late 70s and early 80s and who built her art studio, was told that the painting came from ” a museum in Baltimore”. Her son Matt has speculated that perhaps it was given to his mother as a gift by someone years earlier, but if that was the case who was the gift giver? Why did his mother not question this person where it had come from, since that would have been an extremely valuable gift? Was the heady prospect of owning a real Renoir too much temptation to resist and she accepted it, no questions asked? Or did she not really believe herself that it was real, but like to pretend to others that it was? I find it hard to believe that she would not have known it was real, given her background, but more so, she was known to have spoken of it’s authenticity and how ‘priceless’ it was. It certainly is very suspicious as well that she had told at least two people that it came from a ‘museum’, which implies that she knew something about it’s provenance.

It seems clear that Martha must have known it was stolen, or, at the very least, acquired by her family by questionable means, thus the various stories that were given by her regarding where it came from. Did she hope that enough time had passed that no red flags would be thrown up? Did she herself do any internet searches about the painting and, not finding anything, decided there was nothing to worry about? It seems very likely. But, if she really had no suspicions or knowledge of the painting being stolen, and she really was innocent of it all, then why not be upfront about the fact that she had no idea where it came from other than her mother had had it many years? Why tell such stories? The fact that she was seemingly attempting to sell it on the sly from her family also is rather questionable behavior. Additionally, Martha’s rude and defensive behavior and bitter remarks following the FBI seizing the painting, and her attempts to get her brother to retract his comments about the painting being in his mother’s studio for decades and support her flea market story, seems to point to Martha being guilty of knowing that the painting’s possession by her family was not by legal means.

My own suspicion about who stole the painting is that it could have very likely been Marcia Fouquet herself. She was attending college in Baltimore the same year the painting went missing. She was a fine arts student and probably very often visited the collections at the BMA. Whomever stole the painting probably just plucked it off the wall and tucked it into their handbag or under their coat because it was so small. Nothing else was stolen, which suggests that the person who took it was an art lover who admired Renoir and wanted it for their personal collection. They never attempted to sell it, which also further suggests it was someone who didn’t want money. Was it a spur of the moment, impulsive action by a young fine arts major student, who couldn’t resist the thrill? Did she perhaps intend to copy the painting and then return it, but then became afraid she would get caught if she tried to bring it back so she kept it instead? Or was it an admirer of hers, a boyfriend perhaps, who stole it for her and she accepted the gift even though she knew it was wrong to do so? Or, even more possible, she had asked someone to steal it for her.

Those suspicions bring up other questions, however. If Marcia stole the painting herself, why hang it up in her art studio and deliberately show people? Why brag about owning a “real Renoir”? People recalled seeing it in her home as early as the 1980s, which implies that for 30 years or so it might have been hidden away, although her son initially said in early reports that the painting had been in the family for 50-60 years, so either he was way off on his reckoning on how early he had been aware of it, or that was something his mother had told him. Other than the insurance claim and payment that was noted on a file card in the BMA’s library, they themselves seem to have forgotten they ever owned it, and other than an old police report, there seemed to be no other documents in existence, and virtually no press coverage either, so it appeared the theft had been lost to time. Perhaps because 20-30 years had passed she didn’t feel it was a danger anymore to display it or speak of it . Or it had been given to her by someone and she had known or suspected it was stolen, but chose to ignore that fact, and decided to adopt a “don’t ask, don’t tell” mentality. As long as she didn’t have to know it was stolen, she could pretend it wasn’t. People can do extraordinary things with their minds when they are in denial. And when they are eventually caught in a lie they often do what she did; say nothing. Which is also what guilty people do. Marcia Fouquet still seems to me to be the most likely culprit, and if not of the theft itself, of knowing that it was probably stolen but never reporting it, of keeping it in hopes that nobody would ever notice ,until her daughter decided to try and sell it behind her back. It’s a mystery that will likely remain unresolved.

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paysage_Bords_de_Seine, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/renoir-girl-unmasked-as-loudoun-countys-marcia-martha-fuqua/2013/04/04/32391550-9722-11e2-814b-063623d80a60_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/mother-of-renoir-girl-may-not-have-known-she-was-trying-to-sell-stolen-painting/2013/12/05/8df60dfc-5cee-11e3-95c2-13623eb2b0e1_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/flea-market-renoir-was-first-offered-to-different-auction-house-with-different-story-official-says/2013/04/13/b75f9e3c-a21e-11e2-82bc-511538ae90a4_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/witnesses-say-flea-market-renoir-was-seen-in-familys-home-decades-ago/2013/05/04/2d657db4-add1-11e2-a986-eec837b1888b_story.html