Million-Dollar Stolen Painting? Oh, that! It’s in the trash.
New Yorker Elizabeth Gibson who found a painting in a rubbish skip in Manhattan, which turned out to be Mexican painter Rufino Tamayo’s ‘Three People’, a painting stolen from storage years ago, and worth $1 million!
She had it hanging on her wall for months before the gallery stickers on the back of the frame led her to investigate more. The painting has now been returned to its owner who bought it as a gift for his wife in the 70s.
Gibson will get only $15,000, the original recovery offer.
How bizarre! It seems sort of unfair that she only gets the original recovery money, but then again, she did just find it.
What would you do if you found a painting in the trash, and it turned out to be worth money?
Interesting Tidbit, Question for You 
1 November 2007, 00:18
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Quite obvious what anyone would do: we’d cash it in xD
If I found a painting and suspected it was worth money, I would have to find out where it belonged. I would feel too guilty keeping a painting that could possibly be stolen…
go on a bidding, i guess.
Haha, if I found a painting in the trash, I would definitely get the money for it.
And then someone would knock sense and sympathy into me and tell me to give it back to its rightful owner.
Which I probably would end up doing.
I’d turn it in. It’s best to be honest. Especially when dealing with million dollar paintings.
And besides, $15,000 is no small sum of money.
I don’t believe in stealing and if I had found that painting, I would have first taken it home, and second go online and try to find the source of it. If it is owned by someone then I’d have it returned, but my question is, why would such a valueble painting be in the trash? It’s a bit bizarre.
If I was a brave and courageous person, I’d keep it and sell it.
Unfortunately, I’m neither so I’d just turn it in and take the $15,000
I heard about that story in the news. If I were her I would have returned it to it’s rightful owner just as she did. Although, I believe that she deserves a lot more money for her honesty in the same token $15,000 is better than nothing at all. And besides a clean conscious too me is priceless.
The story puts a whole new spin too the old saying “one mans trash is another mans treasure”
Take care.
If it’s pretty, I’ll keep it.
If it’s one of those abstract things that I don’t understand, I’ll return it. XD lolol.
I mean, there’s no way to know with those paintings if they are valuable or not. :/ They could just be a 20$ copy of a painting. So unless you really look everywhere, you wouldn’t be able to find out what it is.
And 15,000$ for just finding it? I think that’s a pretty good sum.
There’s no way that you could sell on an expensive painting like that, without the original owners finding out about it - so you’d have no choice other than to return it really, would you?
@Phoebe
XD Ah, youth. Younger commentors just come out and say what everyone’s thinking.
Except that it would be pretty obvious to the owners (and the police) if it was sold on eBay or something.
@Nichole
You’re a good person, then. Most of us would just sell it, take the money, and RUN.
@gyk
Huh? You mean sell it on eBay or something?
@Mitali
! Another person with morals. This is making Mari feel very guilty for knowing she’d just sell it and play dumb when the cops came knocking.
@Josh
Everyone else who commented here is like a voice of reason. Mari would literally just take the money and run like her butt was on fire. XD
Yeah, it is best to be honest.
Well, true. $15,000 isn’t exactly chump change.
@Elizabeth
Apparently the thieves no longer had any use for it. Honestly, it is really strange to think of why it would be in the trash, just waiting for someone to pick it up.
Maybe the thieves/thief had died, and someone cleaned out their house or apartment? Who knows.
@Kaisa
Or you could phrase it as “unafraid of the police”.
Actually, she probably didn’t know that it was worth anything. It’s amazing to think that there are good people on this Earth…and that Mari is not one of them. XD
@Channell
Really? Our local news never picks up anything on the Internet news until 3 months later.
Definitely, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”
@Hiro
Abstract is really something you have to immediately see something in or you just don’t like it. XD
True, it could just be a knockoff, but the stuff on the back told the lady that it was worth something.
Now that Mari thinks about it, that is a pretty good amount of cash just for finding and returning it.
@Starlet
Unless you’re an IDIOT like Mari and don’t think about things like that.
There is virtually no way that they wouldn’t find out. You make a very good point.
I remember seeing this news article and thinking to myself, “damn but I bet she wishes she had hawked it somewhere instead”. XD
Wow, to find a painting worth so much in the trash, that’s so absurd. Kinda makes you wonder what idiot tossed it in the first place. I’d demand the full cost heh.
ah, but see, you don’t know how much they are going to pay you to return it.
lolz. XD
and beg your mom for candy? come now.
I just stole them! XDDD
I’d sell it
I’m greedy like that!
And shouldn’t the woman get more than $15,000, considering inflation and all that jazz?
What I would do with the painting depends on several things, such as the painter, the actual painting, and the condition of the painting, but I’d probably eventually sell it. But only because I could really use the money.
@Joana
XD If it had been Mari, Mari would have sold it at a pawn shop or on eBay or something.
@Julie
Yeah, the circumstances for finding it in the trash are pretty sketchy. Wish we knew more about it…
@Evie
XD Yay. Now Mari doesn’t feel like too much of a sleazebag for wanting to just sell it.
Good point. $15,000 was worth a lot more 30 years ago than it is today.
@Jessica
Mari really needs money too. Mari doesn’t know how she’s going to pay her bills now that she quit PPP…
Come on McDonald’s, start hiring again!
I think it’s cool that she did the right thing XD
I would’ve as well, I mean she did get 15,000 richer, even if that’s all she got, like you said, all she did was /find/ it
@Manda
True…luck shouldn’t win people everything. Sometimes you have to work for your money instead of steal it.
Thats a big bit of luck!!
if i saw a painting in the rubbish I would probably leave it, unless I thought it looked nice lol. But if I found out that it was worth money, it would make my..year haha ^_^
I would like to say I’d keep it… because I’m an art lover… but I know I really wouldn’t. I’d feel bad if I found out it was stolen.
@Becky
Really? You would leave it unless it immediately caught your eye? Interesting. Then again, it was in the trash, so that’s pretty understandable.
@Fruity
Mari wouldn’t just feel bad, Mari would feel guilty! Mari would be looking over her shoulder a little for cops. XD Just a little…
But Mari would probably really keep or sell it. Mari’s just a desperado like that. *twirls 1890s-silent-picture-style villain’s mustache*