VERO BEACH — The Vero Beach Museum of Art is pleased to announce the final lecture in its 2010 International Lecture Series, Secrets of the Gardner Heist, on Monday, March 15, presented by acclaimed writer, author, and reporter Ulrich Boser.
Shortly after midnight on March 18, 1990, two men dressed as police officers broke into the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston and stole 13 masterpieces including five Degas, three Rembrandts, and a Vermeer. The plundered works are worth an estimated $500 million, and the theft remains the largest unsolved art heist in history. Traveling deep into the art underworld, Ulrich Boser explored unfinished leads and came across a remarkable cast of characters, including the brilliant rock ‘n’ roll art thief; the golden-boy gangster who professes his innocence in rhyming verse; and the Boston heiress Isabella Stewart Gardner, who stipulated in her will that nothing should ever be changed in her museum.
In The Gardner Heist: The True Story of the World’s Largest Unsolved Art Theft, Boser describes how he uncovered new evidence about the identities of the men who robbed the museum twenty years ago. A tale of art and greed, of obsession and loss, the story of The Gardner Heist is as compelling as the stolen masterpieces themselves.
Ulrich Boser is an award-winning writer, editor, and researcher with a deep background in education and criminal justice issues. Covering cultural and social policy topics, his work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Smithsonian. He has been an Arthur F. Burns fellow, won the National Award for Education Reporting, and served as a commentator for CNN, FOX News, NPR, MSNBC, and The New York Times, and appeared as an invited lecturer at a variety of institutions from Stanford University to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Tickets $65; $55 for Museum members. The lecture begins at 4:30 pm, and is followed by a reception at 5:30 pm with the speaker.
Information and tickets: Call (772) 231-0707 ext.136 or visit www.verobeachmuseum.org.
