This is a story of the greatest art heist ever done, it was carried out by an Italian named vincenzo peruggia and the painting was the world famous mona Lisa, drawn by Leonardo da vici between 1503 to 1507 and sold to the king Francis I of France back in the 15th century.
The mona lisa
Peruggia who stole the painting from the France louvre museum wasn't arrested for many years until he tried selling it to another .Peruggia also claimed the painting was stolen from Italy and he was being a patriot of his home country Italy, by stealing it back and trying to return it to where it belonged and that proved to be a lie .
The case wasn't really understood because the French authorities found it hard to believe it was done single handeldly but peruggia worked as a workman in the museum and was hired to make glass frames for paintings in the museum so it's very likely he could do it alone.
Now the real question is why was the picture stolen.
He claimed it was an act of patriotism but he tried selling it to business men at expensive prices. One thing to note here is the mona Lisa wasn't much of a big deal before it was stolen but after it came out in the news that the art fact was missing there was an uproar at the museum and government that they weren't competent and the painting only got more famous. At some point individuals went all the way to the museum to see the empty space where the mona Lisa was supposed to be .
Peruggia was a 29 year old painter at the time he stole the mona lisa. The louvre Museum hired him on several occasions to cover paintings with glass and do some wall designs,he knew the museum like the palm of his hands. He had read about Napoleon Bonaparte stealing treasures when he sacked the city of italy so he managed to convince himself that the painting was being illegally kept in the louvre museum.
Peruggia
While working on the glass cover for the painting after museum hours he simply removed it from it from, folded it and kept it in his smock and walked out confidently . The theft wasn't discovered until the next day and workers at the museum just assumed it was being cleaned. Over the years the mona Lisa was still being searched for and became more famous than it had ever been. When peruggia tried selling it one of the buyers reported to the French police and he was apprehended . To this day the mona Lisa is still the most expensive ever insured painting at about €800million and has even been loaned to a museum and New york once in the 1970s .
(Reference images from goodle)