Lost and found: 5 pieces of Dutch Golden Age art have been recovered after a 10 year hunt

Five artworks from the Dutch Golden Age are finally returning to their rightful place, more than a decade after they disappeared into the shadowy depths of the illicit art market.

The works belong to the Westfries Museum, located in the Dutch maritime town of Hoorn, where they will be unveiled on October 7 – a far cry from Ukraine, where the paintings were uncovered.

A new deal

In January 2005, thieves are thought to have hidden inside a coffin on display inside the museum before disabling the security system and taking off with 24 paintings and 70 pieces of silverware. It was the bulk of the museum’s 17th and 18th century collection, worth approximately 1.3 million euros ($1.45 million).

With no solid leads, it was feared the paintings would never be traced. But in July 2015, the museum’s director, Ad Geerdink, received word that someone from a Ukrainian militia force, a man named Borys Humeniuk, had made contact with the Dutch embassy in Kiev.

A deputy commander from the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, Humeniuk claimed to have found the paintings, and said he was willing to hand them over.

“He said his battalion had found all 24 painting in a villa belonging to former president Viktor Yanukovych while fighting Russian separatists in the east of the country,” claimed Geerdink.

In 1911, Leonardo Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" was stolen from the Louvre by an Italian who had been a handyman for the museum. The now-iconic painting was recovered two years later.

A statue called "Young Girl With Serpent" by Auguste Rodin was stolen from a home in Beverly Hills, California, in 1991. It was returned after someone offered it on consignment to Christie's auction house. Rodin, a French sculptor considered by some aficionados to have been the father of modern sculpture, lived from 1840 until 1917. His most famous work, "The Thinker," shows a seated man with his chin on his hand.

Picasso's "La Coiffeuse" ("The Hairdresser") was discovered missing in 2001 and was recovered when it was shipped from Belgium to the United States in December 2014. The shipper had listed the item as a $37 piece of art being sent to the United States as a Christmas present.

Italy's Culture Ministry unveils two paintings by the French artists Paul Gauguin and Pierre Bonnard on April 2, 2014. The paintings were stolen from a family house in London in 1970, abandoned on a train and then later sold at a lost-property auction, where a factory worker paid 45,000 Italian lira for them -- roughly equivalent to 22 euros ($30) at the time.

A 19th-century Renoir painting was stolen from a US museum in 1951 and then bought at a flea market in 2010. A judge later ruled that it to be returned to the museum. The 5½-by-9-inch painting, titled "Landscape on the Banks of the Seine," was bought for $7 at a flea market by a Virginia woman.

Seven famous paintings were stolen from the Kunsthal Museum in Rotterdam, Netherlands, in 2012, including two Claude Monet works, "Charing Cross Bridge, London" and "Waterloo Bridge." The other paintings, in oil and watercolor, were Picasso's "Harlequin Head," Henri Matisse's "Reading Girl in White and Yellow," Lucian Freud's "Woman with Eyes Closed," Paul Gauguin's "Femme devant une fenêtre ouverte, dite la Fiancee" and Meyer de Haan's "Autoportrait."

A Salvador Dali painting stolen from a Manhattan art gallery by a man posing as a potential customer in 2012. It was later intercepted by customs police after it was sent back to the United States from Greece.

In 1473, Hans Memling's "The Last Judgment" was stolen by pirates and became the first documented art theft.

Adam Worth, the inspiration for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's diabolical character Moriarty, stole "Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire," painted by Thomas Gainsborough in 1876.

The Nazis plundered countless precious artworks during World War II, including "Adele Bloch-Bauer I," by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt, which was confiscated from the owner as he fled Austria.

Many works of art that were taken by the Nazis were never recovered. Others were returned after years of legal battles. "Christ Carrying the Cross," by Italian artist Girolamo de' Romani, was returned to its owner's family in 2012.

A version of Edvard Munch's "The Scream" was one of two paintings by the artist to be stolen from the Munch Museum in Oslo, Norway, in 2004.

Notorious art heists

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It was now a question of what Humeniuk wanted in return. At this point, the museum enlisted the help of Dutch art historian and art crime investigator Arthur Brand.

From the start Brand knew the issue would be money.

“If you have stolen paintings in your possession, of course you can ask for a reward,” said Brand. “But if you ask, you have to accept the reward that is there. If you do not, then you’re engaging in a criminal act.”

Meeting in Kiev – and armed with official valuations – Brand told Humeniuk that in its badly damaged state, the entire collection was worth not millions, but around 500,000 euros ($560,000), and offered a finders fee of 50,000 euros ($56,000).

“Humeniuk said he would talk with his soldiers, but I saw in his eyes that it was the end of any deal,” said Brand.

An illegal art market

With 15 years of experience in the illicit art trade, not much surprises Brand anymore. He’s recovered well over 200 works of art, including ancient Aztec artifacts, antique porcelain plates and numerous paintings looted by the Nazis.

In one of his most high profile cases, Brand aided German police in the retrieval of a pair of bronze horse sculptures by Josef Thorak that once belonged to Adolf Hitler.

According to Interpol, it’s almost impossible to put a financial figure on the illicit art trade, although the FBI and the US Department of Justice have called it the third highest-grossing criminal trade in the world after drugs and arms.