Dutch Art Detective Recovers Six Stolen Paintings from Medemblik Town Hall

Wed, 06 May 2026 23:16:00 +0200

Dutch art detective Arthur Brand, renowned for his ability to recover stolen artworks, has successfully retrieved six paintings recently stolen from the Medemblik town hall in the Netherlands. This follows his earlier high-profile recovery of a Vincent Van Gogh painting titled 'The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring' from 1884. According to Brand, he was at home watching television last Friday when an unknown man arrived and asked him to help unload items from a car. The items turned out to be the stolen paintings, valued at approximately €100,000, including historical portraits of William I of Orange and King Radbod, the last ruler of Frisia. Brand believes the thieves, intimidated by media attention surrounding his previous Van Gogh recovery, returned the artworks rather than attempting to sell them, as selling such historically significant paintings would have been nearly impossible. The Medemblik municipality had offered a €10,000 reward for their return, but Brand declined the m