Something light for a Sunday afternoon. The intersection between art and crime conjures up visions of complicated schemes (ala The Thomas Crown Affair ) concocted by daring criminals who have an appreciation for the masterpieces they target. Real world thefts tend to be much less romantic : the alleged thief, while drunk, saw scaffolding on the outside of the building and decided on an impulse to steal the sculpture, police said. [...] the thief was unaware of the sculpture's worth until he saw a story on the news the next day. This is probably because the most competent criminals avoid art, since well-known pieces are very difficult to resell (or ransom); the risk/reward ratio doesn't match what Hollywood portrays. Below the fold, the story of the theft and eventual recovery of the Madonna of the Yarnwinder.

There are multiple versions of this work; the original, by Leonardo da Vinci , has probably been lost, but he may have painted at least part of some of the copies. The images shown above link to further discussion; from wikipedia:

The Madonna of the Yarnwinder (c. 1501) is the subject of several oil paintings after a lost original by Leonardo da Vinci. They depict the Virgin Mary with the Christ child, who looks longingly at a yarnwinder which the Virgin could use to measure off yarn. The yarnwinder serves as a symbol both of Mary's domesticity and the Cross on which Christ was crucified, and may also suggest the Fates, understood in classical mythology as spinners.

There is perhaps a hint of the Mona Lisa smile in the expression of the Madonna here, and the turn of the child coupled with the raised hand of the woman creates a pleasing sense of dynamic action, but the painting is not all that famous outside of the art world. One of the versions thought to include Leonardo's work was stolen from a private residence in Scotland in 2003; from the Guardian :

Thieves posing as tourists overpowered a female guide, plucked the painting, which experts say is worth up to £30m, from the wall, and made off with it in an ageing, white Golf GTi. [...] Although it has been disputed whether it is a genuine Leonardo or the work of a pupil, most experts now agree that it can be attributed to the Renaissance master. As such it is immensely valuable, but utterly impossible to sell.

Hardly a high-tech crime, with no laser beams to evade or sophisticated alarm-triggered lock-down to avoid, but hardly a lucrative heist either due to the notoriety of the work and the consequent difficulty of selling it. More information on the theft is here . It was on the FBI top ten art crimes and there were significant efforts undertaken to find the thieves and recover the painting, but no real progress was made for years. Then, in 2007, the story has a mostly happy ending :

“About 11.20am yesterday morning officers from Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary went to a solicitor’s office in the centre of Glasgow, where they recovered the painting Madonna with Yarnwinder, which had been stolen from Drumlanrigh Castle at Thornhill in August 2003.”

[...] Although “overjoyed” that the masterpiece had been found, the duke said that he was sorry that his father, who died last month aged 83, had not lived to see its recovery. He said: “Our pleasure is inevitably tinged by sadness that my father, who died just a month ago, should not have lived to see the safe return of this wonderful work of art.”

Heck of a story, and probably representative of typical art thefts: an surprisingly brazen crime, then a period of time while the police search for the art and the criminal looks for a buyer, then eventual recovery when the criminal gives up or is caught in a sting. File this one under random journeys through wikipedia...