New York, 27 July 2012
Subash Chandra Kapoor, owner of the Art of the Past Gallery on Madison Avenue, will be convicted for the theft of Indian antiques. Federal authorities have raided his storage facility and have discovered an extraordinary collection of religious artworks stolen from temples valued at more than $20m.
This 61-year-old gallery owner has been in custody for two weeks now in his home country on a related case; he was heard by an Indian court on 25 July. He was extradited from Germany to India following an Interpol warrant issued last autumn.
His gallery, opened in 1976 in Upper East Side, had a storage facility to store its statues on the 83rd street. The police went to search what must be the most impressive private collection in New York, and discovered dozens of stone and bronze statues of every size dating from the 10th century and estimated at several million dollars. Among them, a Shiva statue estimated at $3,5m and a Uma Parvati statue valued at $2,5m. The statues had been stolen from Indian temples and passed through Hong Kong before being smuggled in his New York gallery.
This gallery owner is an official Indian art supplier for many prestigious museums such as the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Metropolitan Museum of New York.
On his gallery’s storefront, one can read “closed for inventory”!