Sunday Briefing: Stealing Beauty a Short History of Art Theft Last Week's Audacious Raid On Pablo Picasso's Granddaughter's House, in Which Two of His Paintings Worth More Than Euro60m Were Stolen, Once More Raised the Question: Why Bother?

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IN a world where paintings and sculptures are stolen to order, the body of work left by cubist master Pablo Picasso is highly valued, and also among the worst hit by thefts.

In the latest heist, burglars slipped unnoticed into the Paris apartment of Picasso's granddaughter last week and spirited away two portraits of beloved women in the master's life, slicing one canvas clean out of its frame.

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Sunday Briefing: Stealing Beauty a Short History of Art Theft Last Week's Audacious Raid On Pablo Picasso's Granddaughter's House, in Which Two of His Paintings Worth More Than Euro60m Were Stolen, Once More Raised the Question: Why Bother?

Police are still not sure how exactly they entered the apartment of Diana Widmaier-Picasso, whose grandmother was Marie-Therese Walter, one of Pablo's many conquests. Walter killed herself four years after Picasso died in 1973, still distraught that he had never legally married her.

The two tableaux that were taken were of Picasso's daughter Maya and his second wife Jacqueline, and are worth an estimated dollars66 million (GBP34m). Of the 13,000 paintings and designs, 100,000 prints, 300 sculptures and 34,000 book illustrations Picasso produced it is estimated that around...

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