Thieves steal £32m Van Gogh painting

A painting by Vincent van Gogh valued at £32m (€39m) has been stolen from a Cairo museum, the Egyptian minister of culture said today.

Farouk Hosni said police are searching for thieves who lifted the painting from the Mahmoud Khalil Museum today.

Mr Hosni said authorities at all of Egypt’s air and sea ports have been notified and that an investigation is under way at the museum.

The museum’s director, Reem Bahir, said the artwork goes by two titles, Poppy Flowers and Vase with Flowers.

This is the second time the painting has been stolen from the Cairo museum. Thieves made off with the canvas in 1978, before authorities recovered it two years later at an undisclosed location in Kuwait.

But authorities never reported whether the thieves were charged or tried.

The painting resembles a flower scene painted by the French artist Adolphe Monticelli, whose work deeply affected the young Van Gogh. The Monticelli painting is also part of the Khalil collection.

Most of the canvasses for which Van Gogh is remembered were painted in 29 months of frenzied activity before his suicide in 1890 aged 37.

Experts have said they believe the Cairo canvas was painted in around 1887.

Other works in the Khalil collection, all from the 19th-century French School, are by Paul Gauguin, Gustave Courbet, Francois Millet, Claude Monet, Edouard Manet, Auguste Renoir and Auguste Rodin.