The Thief Collector

When thieves aggressively ripped a $160 million Willem de Kooning painting from its frame at a Tucson, Arizona, museum in 1985, the mystery of the stolen artwork became local lore. Questions only deepened surrounding one of the most puzzling heists of the 20th century when the peerless painting shockingly reappeared, discovered among the items in a middle-class New Mexico widow’s estate sale. How did Rita Alter and her husband, Jerry, both mild-mannered schoolteachers, come to possess de Kooning’s work? Breadcrumbs left behind by the late couple slowly reveal a life rife with duplicity and crime. One of the art world’s most bizarre and surreal stories unfolds in this fascinating documentary.