Stolen Paintings Linked to Retired Couple Who Supposedly Moonlighted as Art Thieves Returned to New Mexico Museum After 40 Years
Victor Higgins’ “Aspens” and Joseph Henry Sharp’s “Oklahoma Cheyenne” had been missing since March 1985, when they were snatched in broad daylight
/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/accounts/headshot/SarahKuta.png)
Paintings with ties to an infamous New Mexico couple have been returned to the museum they were stolen from 40 years ago.
Last Friday, officials at the University of New Mexico’s Harwood Museum of Art unveiled Victor Higgins’ oil painting Aspens (circa 1932) and Joseph Henry Sharp’s oil-on-canvas piece Oklahoma Cheyenne (circa 1915), also known as Indian Boy in Full Dress. The men were members of the Taos Society of Artists, a group of visual artists based in Taos, New Mexico, between 1915 and 1927.
The paintings had been missing from the museum’s walls since March 1985, when they were snatched in broad daylight. It took four decades and lots of sleuthing by an amateur historical crime researcher to get them back to their rightful owner. They’re now on display as part of the museum’s “The Return of Taos Treasures” exhibition.
The FBI, which located and recovered the works, has not announced any arrests in connection with the theft. However, the missing masterpieces have been linked with Jerry and Rita Alter, an unassuming husband and wife who purportedly led double lives as high-stakes art thieves.
Jerry died in 2012, followed by Rita in 2017. After the couple’s deaths, antiques dealer David Van Auker was tasked with appraising the contents of their three-bedroom home in Cliff, New Mexico, a tiny town near the state’s southwestern corner.
/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/24/2a/242ac2c5-6a8a-4e4f-9a6a-665ec2885d1a/61_harwood_museum_by_bill_curry.jpg)
Van Auker found a painting hanging in the couple’s primary bedroom that turned out to be Willem de Kooning’s 1955 Woman-Ochre, which had been pilfered from the University of Arizona Museum of Art in November 1985. A photograph of the couple placed them in Tucson the day before the theft.
The discovery of the missing de Kooning—worth an estimated $160 million and eventually returned to the Arizona museum—made headlines around the world. In 2022, director Allison Otto explored the story further in her documentary The Thief Collector.
Lou Schachter, who became a historical crime researcher after retiring from his corporate job, wondered if other works in the Alters’ estate might have also been purloined. He started poking around and eventually realized that two other paintings found in the Alters’ home—Aspens and Oklahoma Cheyenne—were also stolen.
“The account of the theft at the Harwood is almost identical to the account of the theft at the University of Arizona Museum,” Schachter told the Silver City Daily Press’ Juno Ogle last year. “A guy comes in in a big overcoat [and] slashes the painting with a packing knife. He rolls it up and stores it in his overcoat and leaves.”
A photo featured in The Thief Collector also shows Jerry playing a clarinet next to a wall of artwork, including Aspens and Oklahoma Cheyenne, as Taos News’ Geoffrey Plant reported in December.
Schachter didn’t quite know what to do with what he’d uncovered. So, he decided to send an email explaining his findings to the Harwood’s executive director, Juniper Leherissey.
“I responded right away,” Leherissey tells Taos News’ Haven Lindsey. “I wasn’t aware of the stolen paintings but recognized right away that this was something we needed to act on.”
The museum quickly organized a volunteer task force to dig into Schachter’s claims. Five weeks later, they alerted the FBI, which launched its own investigation in the spring of 2024. Detectives were able to track down the paintings and return them to the museum roughly a year later, on May 12.
The FBI did not share many details about its investigation, nor how it located the missing paintings. They had been donated to a now-closed thrift store, which sold them through the Scottsdale Art Auction in 2018.
/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/1d/75/1d754f91-b7fa-445e-b9e5-bbf9770f7b95/7_the_return_of_taos_treasures_exhibition_photo_by_brad_trone.jpg)
“The cooperation of multiple individuals and other entities contacted during the investigation was critical to the recovery of these paintings,” notes the FBI statement announcing the paintings’ return. “All investigative leads have been exhausted at this time.”
The FBI also notes in its statement that the Theft of Major Artwork statute—a law enacted in 1994 that makes it a federal crime to steal any object of cultural heritage from a museum—was not in effect when the Harwood paintings were stolen.
Now that the paintings have been returned, what’s next for Schachter? Will he continue his amateur detective work?
“Anything is possible,” he tells KOB’s Ryan Laughlin. “I do historical work, so I’m not sure if I will stumble on something else I can solve. But certainly this has been a lot of fun.”
“The Return of Taos Treasures” is on view at the Harwood Museum of Art in Taos, New Mexico, through September 7.
