Mother of Art Thief Destroys $1.6 Billion in Art
The First Art Newspaper on the Net    Established in 1996 Sunday, August 31, 2025


Mother of Art Thief Destroys $1.6 Billion in Art



PARIS, FRANCE.- Mireille Breitwieser, the mother of an art thief, destroyed more than 60 paintings by major artists. Her son, Stephane Breitwieser, 31, had amassed a collection of works stolen from 172 European museums. Among the artists included in these stolen works were Brueghel, Boucher and Watteau. The works were worth around $1.6 billion dollars. The mother of the thief claimed she destroyed the works because she was angry when her son got arrested in November. Mireille Breitwieser first took around 100 precious objects, including vases, weapons and musical instruments, and threw them into the Rhine-Rhone canal, about 100 miles from her home in Strasbourg. When she got home, she cut the paintings into small pieces and shoved them down her sink disposal unit with the potato peelings, or hid them at the bottom of her dustbin for collection. Among the museums Stephane Breitwieser stole from are the Louvre andother museums in France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and the Netherlands. Among the works destroyed are The Monkey’s Ball by David Teniers, Sleeping Shepherd by François Boucher, Madeleine de France, Queen of Scotland, by Corneille de la Haye, The Princess of Cleves by Lucas Cranach and Cheating Benefits its Master by Peter Brueghel. Alexandra Smith from Art Loss Register in London stated, "Destruction of canvasses on this scale is almost unprecedented. It is shocking that these canvasses are lost for ever."











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