The investigation opened by the Rome Public Prosecutor’s Office into the Agnelli family art collection centers on the disappearance of a major work by Giorgio De Chirico, The Mystery and Melancholy of a Street. Valued at around €7.5 million, the painting is currently unaccounted for: only a copy was found at the Lingotto, while the original has vanished.

In total, the probe concerns 35 artworks and also places the spotlight on the Ministry of Culture, which prosecutors say is responsible for monitoring, tracing and overseeing the movement of artworks of significant cultural interest, even when they are privately owned. The alleged crimes include receiving stolen goods and the illegal export of artworks. No suspects have been formally identified so far.

The case unfolds against the backdrop of the long-running legal dispute over the estate of Gianni Agnelli, involving his daughter Margherita and his grandchildren John, Lapo and Virginia. While owners are entitled to move artworks abroad, they are required to notify the Ministry. Failure to do so could lead to confiscation should the works resurface.

In addition to the De Chirico, copies of The Stairway of Farewells by Giacomo Balla and Glaçons, effet blanc by Claude Monet have also been identified. Investigators believe the originals may have been transferred to Switzerland or Morocco. Checks on past oversight, entrusted to Italy’s Carabinieri unit for the protection of cultural heritage, go back as far as the 1950s, a period after which several works effectively disappeared from official records.