How an Obsesion with Art Crime Became a Thriller – Crime Reads

Artist and author Jonathan Santlofer on the many works examining art fraud, theft, and looting that informed his new book If you have ever wanted to know how it feels to snatch a painting from a museum wall, slide it under your shirt, and take off, then Michael Finkel’s, The Art Thief is for you. Finkel puts you in the scene and in the mind of Stephane Breistwieser, a man who stole more than 200 artworks from European museums and churches for a combined worth of $2 billion dollars. Breistwieser loved art, believed he could take care of it better than any museum, never sold a single piece, and lived with it until he couldn’t (a spoiler I will not disclose). At just over two-hundred-pages it’s a concise page-turner, a book for anyone interested in the criminal mind, with all the daring and chutzpah it takes to steal art, a true tale that will thrill … Read more

‘The Lost Van Gogh’ tells the story of art sold like heroin – Pittsburgh Post Gazette

By Jeffrey Condran Jonathan Santlofer’s latest art historical thriller, “The Lost Van Gogh,” does everything the reader most admires about the genre: it’s a page-turner that follows compelling characters who not only dodge bullets — when they’re not firing them — but also engages in serious aesthetic and moral concerns regarding the value of art in people’s lives. Vincent van Gogh is the perfect subject for this novel, as important ideas about insanity and suicide, about the notion of the solitary genius, and about the power of images, are so often attached to the Dutch painter’s life and work. The evidence, if it’s needed, is right before our eyes with the last few years bringing us immersive exhibitions and multiple films made about his life — never mind the continuing flood of merchandise printed with images of his work. Surely, people the world over know more about Van Gogh’s brushstrokes than any other artist’s. Glimpse … Read more

Artist-author Santlofer’s ‘The Lost van Gogh’ is a brisk, engrossing mystery – South Florida SunSentinel

By Oline H. Cogdill Artist Jonathan Santlofer, whose meticulous research and insight to the creative process has made him the most prominent author of art-based mysteries, takes his engrossing approach to a new level with “The Lost van Gogh.” A sense of authenticity permeates the novels of Santlofer, whose artwork has been exhibited in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Art Institute of Chicago, among others. Yet Santlofer never lets his research overwhelm his exciting plots. There is plenty of fodder for gripping plots with Nazi-looted art and the lucrative criminal enterprises of forgeries, thefts and more. The FBI and several large cities have art crime divisions. “The Lost van Gogh” marks the return of artist Luke Perrone and his girlfriend, Alexis Verde, last seen in Santlofer’s 2021 “The Last Mona Lisa.” The couple may have a missing self-portrait by Vincent van Gogh hidden under a rather ordinary painting Alexis bought from a … Read more

New York Magazine – TO DO

Read The Lost Van Gogh Estate-sale purchase gone wrong. Sourcebooks Landmark, January 2 Under the plain image of a woman’s face is the last, or next to last, self-portrait of Vincent van Gogh.  Who hid it and how it got into the hands of downtown artist Luke Perrone, last featured in Jonathan Santlofer’s mystery-thriller The Lost Mona Lisa, drives an investigation into both the anxiety of artistic influence  and the power and pain bundled up in a timeless work of art. With Illustrations by the author. – Carl Rosen. New York Magazine

Newsletter 2 – November 2023

I can’t believe Thanksgiving has come and gone. Last newsletter it seemed like my novel was so far from pub date. Now, it’s just around the corner, January 2. There are a couple of opportunities as we near the book launch to win artwork I made for The Lost Van Gogh.  The first, a contest to win one of the original pencil drawings (example at the top of the page). To be eligible all you have to do is pre-order the book HERE and submit an image of your receipt or proof of purchase to my website. Click here to enter the drawing contest The second is a limited-edition signed print made from one of my drawings which will go to anyone kind enough to post my book cover on their social media on its pub date, January 2. To receive a print just visit my website and fill out the form.  Make sure to use the hashtag #thelostvangogh in your social media post. Click … Read more

Library Journal – Review of The Lost Van Gogh

The latest art thriller from Santlofer (The Last Mona Lisa) has historic European locations and appealing characters chasing down art stolen by horrible people. Rumors of a final self-portrait made by Vincent van Gogh on his deathbed have tantalized art historians and collectors since the artist’s death, but the painting is widely believed to be lost forever. Luke Perrone is an artist and great-grandson of the man who stole the Mona Lisa; his girlfriend Alexis Verde is the daughter of an art thief. Together, they discover a portrait that might be the missing van Gogh, but then it disappears from their hands. Reuniting with INTERPOL agent John Washington Smith, the trio set off to Europe to recover the missing painting in the hopes of answering questions about van Gogh’s final days. Soon they’re ensnared in the secrets of masterpieces stolen by the Nazis and protected by members of the French Resistance during World War II. … Read more

Booklist – Review of The Lost Van Gogh

“Writer and artist Santlofer assembled a trio of unlikely art sleuths in The Last Mona Lisa (2021), and now, much to their surprise, they’re thrown together once again. Art historian Alexis Verde (also known as Alexandra Green) acquires a painting that she and her honey, artist and art history teacher Luke Perrone, discover is concealing what just might be a long-lost self-portrait by Van Gogh. Tully, a down-and-out PI, has been hired to secure this work, which is promptly stolen from Alexis when she attempts to have it appraised. Luke reconnects with former INTERPOL analyst John Washington Smith for help, but, like many others, he’s not who he claims to be. As the action shifts to Amsterdam, the levels of deceit and danger escalate precipitously. Amidst the chaos and terror, Santlofer offers sympathetic glimpses into Van Gogh’s life and puzzling death and the French Resistance’s valiant efforts to save Paris’ treasures as the Nazis’ systematically … Read more

Newsletter 1 – September 2023

I have been obsessed with Van Gogh from a very young age, his wildly expressive work, his short tragic life. In art school, when I was trying to be cool, I temporarily rejected him as being too romantic. But later, I came to my senses and fell in love with him again, seeing the structure beneath his brushwork, the mind and genius that guided his hand. And now, I found a way to put him in a novel! THE LOST VAN GOGH is a sequel to THE LAST MONA LISA. The two books share the same protagonists, Luke Perrone, artist, Alexis Verde, art history scholar, and John Washington Smith, INTERPOL art crime analyst, but each has its own independent story. In the first book, Luke is searching for a diary his great-grandfather (the man who stole the Mona Lisa from the Louvre Museum), wrote while in prison for the crime. The novel merged fact and … Read more

The Last Mona Lisa: Your Ticket to Adventure

Bestselling author and fine artist, Jonathan Santlofer, has taken a real-life event – the 1911 theft of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa from the Salon Carré in the Louvre Museum – and used it as the basis for The Last Mona Lisa. A People Magazine Best Book of the Summer, this utterly irresistible adventure focuses on Luke Perrone, an Italian-American artist in his late 30s. Perrone has long been obsessed with his great-grandfather, Vincenzo Peruggia – an Italian artist working at the gallery who removed the protective case and frame and stole La Giocanda, aka the Mona Lisa.There’s a lot to keep track of, but don’t worry about getting lost – Santlofer knows just when and where to switch from one story to the next, what to reveal, and when. His masterful storytelling skills keep the reader eagerly turning pages, tearing breathlessly from past to present, from Paris to Florence and back again. Along with … Read more