Michael Finkel Catches an Art Thief

The Book Case

ABC News

Fiction, Arts, Books, Society & Culture

4.1 • 766 Ratings

🗓️ 22 June 2023

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you have never heard of Stéphane Breitwieser don’t feel bad, we hadn’t either. Turns out he is one of the most successful art thieves of all time. In his hey day, he could steal more than once a day (museums, cathedrals, chateaus…you name it); billions of dollars worth of art. That’s right, billions. Thank goodness for the writer Michael Finkel who brings us a page turning book that tells the story of the most incredible art thief you’ve never heard of. The book is called, appropriately, The Art Thief. And this book certainly proves that sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. We are back with a book store this week, Head House Books. Books mentioned in this podcast: The Art Thief by Michael Finkel True Story: Murder, Memoir, Mea Culpa by Michael Finkel The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel The Journalist and Murderer by Janet Malcolm Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann The 12 Live of Samuel Hawley by Hannah Tinti Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin Outline by Rachel Cusk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Is crypto perfect? Nope. But neither was email when it was invented in 1972.
0:05.9	And yet today, we send 347 billion emails every single day.
0:12.0	Crypto is no different. It's new. But like email, it's also revolutionary.
0:17.5	With Crackin, it's easy to start your crypto journey with 24-7 support when you need it.
0:22.5	Go to crackin.com and see what crypto can be.
0:25.3	Don't invest unless you're prepared to lose all the money you invest.
0:27.2	This is a high-risk investment, and you should not expect to be protected if something goes wrong.
0:36.1	Welcome Bibliophiles.
0:37.9	All of you out there, I'm Charlie Gibson.
0:40.1	Welcome to another bookcase.
0:42.4	I am Kate Gibson.
0:44.1	How are you?
0:44.9	Really excited to have you back, bibliophiles.
0:48.1	I'll have to look that word up later.
0:50.2	No, I'm just kidding.
0:51.2	Today, our guest is Michael Finkel,
1:12.9	whose new book, The Art Thief, focuses around an incredibly prolific art thief who was amazingly successful that you might not have heard of. His name is Stefan Breitvisser, and not to sound too, you know, David Hasseloffie, but he's really big in Europe. He went across Europe and he stole billions of dollars worth of art, sometimes in high-brow
1:22.0	ways, sometimes in low-brow ways. It is a fascinating story. I'm not sure many Americans know the story of
1:30.2	Stefan Breitvier, but Kate's right. The amazing statistic to me is he stole a valuable piece of art
1:37.0	every 12 days for seven years. And he didn't sell it. He kept it for his own appreciation and I guess for his own ego as well.
1:48.5	He stashed it all on the walls of an attic room in his mother's house.
1:54.4	Like you do.
	...

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