Art stolen from Sturbridge home in '78 returned to owner

BOSTON -- The sealed wooden box was opened, and Michael Bakwin laid his eyes on the last of seven French paintings stolen from him 32 years ago.

“I think I like them better than I did then. Maybe absence makes the heart grow fonder sometimes, but I really think they’re very, very good,” said Bakwin.

The paintings were stolen from Bakwin’s Stockridge home in 1978.

Authorities said the thief turned the paintings over to an attorney, Robert R. Mardirosian, who hid them in a Swiss bank until the 1990’s. They said when Mardirosian tried to sell them at an auction house in London, an investigator for the British-based Art Lost Register recognized them as stolen.

Julian Radcliffe said he got the most expensive one back, a Cezane (seen below), by negotiating with Mardirosian’s go-between and allowing him to keep the other six paintings.

A Cezane painting

Then, a few years later when Mardirosian tried to sell the remaining paintings, Radcliffe used trickery and deception to get them back.

“And I lied to Sothebys deliberately in order to get the pictures into the jurisdiction. So, I told them they could sell the pictures, and we seized the pictures as soon as they came into England,” said Radcliffe.

One by one, Bakwin got his paintings returned, and in 1999, he sold the Cezane for $28 million. He said the other paintings, worth about $1 million combined, will be kept in a vault and occasionally displayed in his home in New York.

“It’s sort of when they’re taken away from me, you feel like something has really left your life. There’s a big hole there. And now, it’s wonderful to have them back,” said Bakwin.

Authorities said the thief who stole the paintings was shot and killed in connection with another crime.

Mardirosian, the attorney who hid the paintings, is now in prison.

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