‘Stolen’ Picasso Found After Woman Mistakes Painting for Parcel in Madrid
Pablo Picasso’s Still Life With a Guitar hanging safely after being mistakenly taken home by a Madrid resident.
A Picasso went missing, or so the world thought. Interpol listed Still Life With a Guitar as stolen after it vanished en route to Granada for a major exhibition. Panic rippled through the art world—another masterpiece gone. But the truth was far stranger and smaller.
The painting had never left its building. A woman living in the same Madrid apartment block as the owner found a mysterious package by her door and, assuming it was hers, carried it home. She tucked it safely away, unopened, for days. Inside: a Picasso worth millions.
Police were preparing an international hunt before the owner spotted a delivery mix-up. The work was returned, unharmed, its brief disappearance blamed on courier confusion and human error.
For a moment, the art world braced for scandal. In the end, the missing Picasso was just sitting quietly behind a stranger’s sofa.
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