Searches of garages in Birkirkara, carried out yesterday morning, led to the discovery of 29 of the paintings stolen on 5 April. The paintings were hidden behind a false wall in one of the garages.
What could be the most valuable painting stolen, the one attributed to Caravaggio, was found hidden under a bed in a Birkirkara residence. All the paintings had been well preserved and were not damaged in any way.
The four people arrested and being held for questioning are all from Birkirkara. They are aged between 29 and 45.
The police force had been investigating the case night and day for the past three weeks, but to no avail, explained Police Commissioner John Rizzo at a crime conference yesterday. Information received last week turned the investigation around, he said.
Mr Rizzo explained that a number of medals were found together with the paintings and although they had not been in the initial report, they might have been stolen at the same time as the paintings. The police commissioner said this was one of a string of successes for the Maltese police force. Interpol and Europol had been informed of the theft and Mr Rizzo said he will tell them, with great pride, that Malta’s police force had succeeded in retrieving these precious works of art.
San Giovannino al Fonte, probably the most valuable painting in the collection, depicts a young boy peering at the water below him. The play of light and dark, chiaro scuro, is the style associated with Michelangelo Merisi, or Caravaggio as he is more popularly known.
The painting is one the artist actually executed in Malta. St Jerome, The Beheading of St John, Portrait of a Maltese Knight and Sleeping Cupid are the other paintings Caravaggio painted during his stay on the island.
Seated Woman and Landscape with Red Foliage, paintings by Maltese artists Willie Apap and Edward Caruana Dingli, respectively, were among those found hidden behind the false wall.
Almost all the paintings were signed on the back by Vincenzo Bonello, Judge Bonello’s father and former Director of Museums. The collector’s mark VB, found on the reverse of many of the canvases, confirms that the paintings retrieved by police are those that had been stolen from Judge Bonello’s home earlier this month