How to hang paintings so they cannot be easily stolen

Forums: Art, Art Theft, Cooks Who Abscond With Art, Picasso Drawing
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In my own experience, stealing art didn't happen much. But my experience with art was not on the master level.

A small painting was taken from a gallery near us, and it was my business partner who chased the guy (very quick call). He got away, and soon the painting was notched at a local pawn shop, and, if I remember, the thief nabbed.

The recent theft in San Francisco by an apparent thief with taste caught my attention -

the latest on it -

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/07/09/BA151K8B98.DTL
The earlier article more informative. Sorry, no link.

An earlier article described how the art was set up with countervailing hooks.

The gallery (at least in the other article) was said to be reworking the security aspects.

So, I am wondering, what do you do to not have your precious painting stolen?

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I work at a frame shop and you can get a 'lock tite' hanging system. I have never put one together, but the gist of it is you screw in or bolt a metal plate onto the wall where you want to hang the picture. The wire of the picture is then hung on a certain hook and second cable is strung through and then locked in place. The picture isn't going anywhere unless they have an hour and some bolt cutters.

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That wouldn't help the robbers who cut the canvases out of their frames (as in the Gardner heist.)

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@ossobuco,

Best method I ever saw to keep the artwork from being stolen was when Mr.Garcia painted a wall mural in the apartment. He even crafted a nice wooden frame around it.

Of course when the Garcia family moved out, the painting was left for the next family but at least nobody stole it.

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@Aldistar,

I'm going to have to look that up..

We put up canvases carefully, but in relation to each other - not sure something like that would have worked.

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How to hang paintings so they cannot be easily stolen

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