Unresolved Mysteries

In June 2017, Rita Alter, a retired New York teacher, passed way in Cliff, New Mexico, a small community of just under 300 people. An Antique Furniture shop purchased the contents of the house and put them on display in Silver City – a town with a high numbet of artists and art enthusiasts.

Several customers immediately recognized it as a piece by Willem de Kooning, a Dutch American abstract artist from the early 20th century. It had been stolen from an Arizona museum in 1985 – by two suspects matching the description of Rita Alter and her husband Herman.

Fast forward 7 years later, and California writer, Lou Schachter, has recently identified two other paintings from the Alters' catalogue as stolen in 1985 from a New Mexico museum. Schachter had become obsessed with the case after seeing it online and checked the catalogue one by one against various databases of reported stolen art in the southwest.

Article about the two newly identified paintings: https://www.scdailypress.com/2024/03/15/california-writer-finds-two-stolen-works-estate-now-famous-cliff-couple/

A much longer write up on the Alters: https://www.azcentral.com/in-depth/news/local/arizona/2022/10/06/who-were-jerry-and-rita-alter-missing-de-kooning-found-couples-home/8195231001/