Art Collections And Collectors

A multimillion-dollar collection of original work by famed Pop Art icon Andy Warhol was stolen last week from a Los Angeles home, police said Friday. On Sept. 3, a housekeeper for noted art collector Richard L. Weisman walked into the dining room of Weisman's residence and saw that 11 large portraits that had been on the walls the day before were gone, according to Det. Donald Hrycyk, head of the LAPD's art theft detail. The housekeeper called police, and investigators soon brought in Hrycyk, who has spent years chasing forgers and thieves in the shady art underworld.

A federal investigation into looted Asian antiquities at Southland museums has broadened to include a prominent Chicago industrialist and art collector who purchased hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of allegedly stolen artifacts from a Cerritos arts dealer. On Thursday, the same day federal agents raided four Southern California museums suspected of displaying stolen art, authorities also searched the private museum of Barry MacLean, a trustee of the prestigious Art Institute of Chicago.

I'm no fan of public art museums exhibiting private collections. The negatives so far outweigh the positives that such shows hurt, rather than help, a museum's mission. The latest example is "Los Angelenos/Chicano Painters of L.A.: Selections From the Cheech Marin Collection," which opened recently at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. The clumsy title is the least of its problems. "Los Angelenos" is a smaller, more focused version of "Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge."

"The advantage of not being able to produce art is that you can spend all your energy looking at art," said Don Rubell, whose family of self-confessed contemporary art fanatics is perpetually in search of the next addition to its 5,000-piece collection. Pleased to have uttered a complete sentence without being interrupted by Mera, his wife and collecting partner of nearly 45 years, he eased into a knowing smile as she jumped in to explain how their collecting obsession works.

FRED WEISMAN couldn't help it. He just had to buy all that art and stuff it into his house and gardens. During a decade of residence at his Mediterranean-style estate in Holmby Hills, he put Modern classics in the living room, Surrealist paintings in the dining room and an eclectic array of high-spirited contemporary art everywhere else. A giant cat by Fernando Botero stands by the swimming pool. Pop paintings by Roy Lichtenstein grace the lanai.

AS an executive producer for the "Matrix" trilogy, "Mystic River" and "Happy Feet," which is up for an Academy Award on Sunday for best animated feature, Bruce Berman may live in the world of motion pictures, but it's photography that has been his passion since he was a teenager. Berman pursued it until his third year in college, taking road trips and photographing scenes of 20th century Americana. "I didn't think I could make a living at photography," Berman says.

A Norman Rockwell painting stolen from a Missouri gallery 34 years ago was recovered and authenticated Friday in the collection of movie mogul Steven Spielberg. Spielberg's spokesman, Marvin Levy, said the director's staff contacted the FBI several weeks ago after seeing a bulletin from the agency's Art Crime Team seeking clues about the theft of the "Russian Schoolroom" oil painting. "The second anybody said, 'I think we have that painting,' [our] office got a hold of the FBI," Levy said.

THE painting exudes the sweet softness of idyllic village life: A mother, towel wrapped around her head, braids her daughter's hair while a young woman draws a red comb through her own tresses. A girl in a dark dress carries a samovar for tea, a little girl drinks from a white cup, and a cat makes its presence known. Yuri Kugach, 90, still remembers the inspiration for one of his most famous paintings.

In a pledge that reinforces a philanthropic tradition, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles has received the promise of a gift of 33 pieces from Clifford Einstein, chair of MOCA's board of trustees, and his wife, Madeline. The donation comprises works made over the last three decades by an international slate of prominent artists, including Kiki Smith, Nam June Paik, Mark Grotjahn, Sigmar Polke, Mike Kelley and Lari Pittman.

A muezzin calls to prayer from a nearby mosque as Mazen Qupty fills goblets with Israeli Cabernet Sauvignon, pops a disc of oud music into the stereo and starts to lay out his plan for the brilliantly colored paintings that fill his East Jerusalem home. Creating a national art museum for an as-yet-nonexistent country is an ambitious if not quixotic goal. But that's what Qupty hopes to do with his growing trove of Palestinian paintings -- the largest collection of its kind.