Spanish still life slip-up!

With more than £666 million worth of parcels pinched by “porch pirates” from British doorsteps in 2025, it’s hardly surprising householders there are retreating behind video doorbells and CCTV. Even Picasso might have applauded the irony.

In fact, a small Picasso still life staged the most low-key disappearance imaginable. ‘Naturaleza muerta con guitarra’ (1919), a modest gouache and pencil work valued at €600,000, was reported missing last October while supposedly travelling from Madrid to Granada for exhibition. The truth was less glamorous: the painting barely left the building.

When the CajaGranada Foundation failed to receive the work on 3 October, Spain’s Policía Nacional began an investigation. Three weeks later the ‘lost’ Picasso was recovered, taken in by a neighbour after the transport company left the package in a Madrid doorway! Mistaking it for a forgotten delivery, the neighbour stored it safely until her husband recalled news of a “missing Picasso”. The police were promptly called.

The foundation later admitted the works were carefully packaged but incorrectly numbered. The delivery was signed off regardless. Only during unpacking was the painting’s absence noticed.

The exhibition went ahead anyway. Picasso’s work, long coveted by thieves, has survived worse crimes: from Paris burglaries to a London gallery heist at gunpoint. This time, however, art history briefly collided with doorstep logistics, nearly lost – and risked snatching defeat from the jaws of victory!

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Nora Johnson’s 15 critically acclaimed psychological suspense crime thrillers, including the latest ‘The Girl in Red’ (www.nora-johnson.net), all available online at Amazon etc. Profits to Cudeca cancer charity.