Spanish police recover stolen Francis Bacon painting

MADRID

Spanish police said on May 23 they have recovered a five million euro ($5.4 million) painting by late British artist Francis Bacon that was stolen with four other of his works in 2015.

The work is one of five portraits of Spanish banker Jose Capelo by Bacon, together worth over 25 million euros ($27 million), which were stolen from Capelo's Madrid home in July 2015.

The thieves also made off with a safe that contained coins and jewels in what was described at the time as one of the biggest contemporary art thefts in Spain. Police recovered three of the five paintings in 2017.

In a statement, police said they had arrested two people suspected of involvement in the theft, which allowed them to recover one of the stolen works still missing at a property in Madrid.

Police have so far arrested 16 people suspected over the theft since 2015, including the person believed to have ordered the heist and those who carried it out, the statement added.

"Investigations are continuing to locate the remaining work and arrest those in possession of it, with the focus on Spanish nationals with links to organized groups from Eastern Europe," the statement said.

Police did not provide further details about the people involved in the robbery or how they were identified.

Bacon is regarded as one of Britain's greatest recent painters, with some of his expressionist works achieving record amounts at auction.

His triptych "Three Studies of Lucian Freud" sold for $142.4 million at auction in New York in 2013, making it one of the world's most expensive works at the time.

Bacon often visited Madrid, where he spent time studying old masters paintings in the Prado Museum, and died in the city in 1992, aged 82.