Anselm Kiefer’s Workshop
Today we have a pretty interesting case to talk about, robberies from an artist’s workshop, not of art pieces themselves but of the artist’s supplies, even though the completed works are way more valuable than just the raw materials used to construct them.
Anselm Kiefer
The artist we’re going to be talking about today is Anselm Kiefer. Born on March 8, 1945 in Donaueschingen, Germany Kiefer grew up in the aftermath of WWII. His body of work reflects this in themes of German history and the horrors of the Holocaust. In his work over his career he has always been willing to argue with the past and confront, head on, taboo and controversial issues from recent history, he isn’t afraid to bring up his culture’s dark past and his pieces are often very large scale, confrontational in themselves, which mirrors their subject matter well.
He works a lot with lead, clay, straw, ash, and shellac as he constructs massive pieces designed to take up whole rooms and really force the viewer to pay attention to what they have to say, regardless of their discomfort.
The Theft
Alright, back to the matter at hand. Like I said just before, Kiefer uses a lot of natural, raw materials in his huge works meaning that he has to have big quantities of them available to him.
On November 30, 2023 his workshop in Croissy-Beauborg, a town 14 miles east of Paris, was robbed. CCTV footage showed four individuals driving up and breaking through the car barrier. They then entered his warehouse area and cut through a steel fence surrounding a piece that is currently in progress. They made off with some lead books leaving the piece severely damaged and Kiefer estimated that the overall losses amount to more than $1 million.
Even though security guards arrived on the scene within 20 minutes of the thieves arrival and chased them away, it was too late for some of the books which vanished with the perpetrators.
Books play a big role in Kiefer’s work, for example in The High Priestess/Zweistromland the viewer sees two massive bookcases stacked high with lead books. The choice of size and medium symbolizes the weight of knowledge.
Because he loves natural materials, particularly lead, so much he is a target for thieves and this isn’t the first time he’s been robbed for the lead itself, not for his works which, like I said at the beginning, are much more valuable than the components.
In 2016 there was another major theft at his warehouse and again, even though a security guard arrived while the thieves were still there, they managed to get away. That time they took lead in its raw form (before it got sculpted or used in any way) worth about $1860 but the sculpture they damaged in the process had an estimated value of $1.4 million. Again, in 2008 7.5 tonnes of lead was stolen from Kiefer’s previous warehouse in Barjac.
I personally think the thieves are stealing the wrong things but with the raw lead I guess they don’t have to worry about the struggles of selling a stolen, recognizable work of art on the black market.
In terms of the most recent theft, French investigators said that the thieves didn’t understand the value of art and they just saw an opportunity to take these raw materials and took it. The police have not yet confirmed if any suspects have been identified but even if they are, those materials are likely gone for good.
Works Cited
Greenberger, Alex. “Portions of Anselm Kiefer’s Work Worth $1 Million Stolen in France”. ARTNews. 2023. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/anselm-kiefer-work-stolen-warehouse-france-1234688321/
Lawson-Tancred, Jo. “Thieves Stole More Than $1 Million Worth of Parts from an Anselm Kiefer Sculpture”. ArtNet. 2023. https://news.artnet.com/art-world-archives/anselm-kiefer-sculpture-parts-stolen-2403097