One person’s trash is another’s treasure.
A surrealist painting worth $340,000 was recovered from a paper-recycling dumpster in Germany, police say.
The valuable artwork, by French painter Yves Tanguyart, was accidentally left behind by a businessman at Duesseldorf’s airport.
The flier had forgotten the painting, which was packaged in cardboard, at an airport check-in counter before he boarded a flight to Tel Aviv, Israel, on Nov. 27.
By the time the man landed in Israel, realized what he’d done and contacted police, the 16-by-24-inch masterpiece had disappeared.
The mystery was solved only after the businessman’s nephew traveled to the airport from Belgium and talked with police. An inspector was able to trace the painting to a recycling dumpster used by the airport’s cleaning company.
“This was definitely one of our happiest stories this year,” police spokesman Andre Hartwig said. “It was real detective work.”
With AP