‘They were either stolen to order, in which case you’ll never see them again, or they were stolen for resale, in which case you’ll probably never see them again’
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Three painted Maud Lewis Christmas cards stolen in Halifax late last year are likely gone for good, says the billionaire collector who owns more than 200 of her works.
The original artworks — stolen from a Cambridge Street home on Nov. 25 — are each believed to be worth more than $10,000.
“I’m guessing that whoever stole them knew they were there,” said John Risley, whose net worth has been pegged at $1.21 billion by Canadian Business.
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“So, it’s likely that … they were either stolen to order, in which case you’ll never see them again, or they were stolen for resale, in which case you’ll probably never see them again.”
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Canadian police don’t have “a specialty house around art thefts,” said Risley, the co-founder of Clearwater Seafoods.
“The U.S. has figured that out. The Europeans have figured that out. But we don’t have that specialty with Canadian law enforcement folks either at the RCMP or local police force levels. So, they don’t have the capacity to sort of sift through all the auctions where these things might show up and then identify them.”
Compared to her other paintings, especially the ones Lewis did in the latter part of her life, which “tended to be close to a form — she had 10 or 12 kinds of pretty standard paintings and she would do sort of variations on the theme” — the Christmas cards Lewis painted and sold for 25 cents each “were pretty unique,” Risley said.
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“She did every one, in many cases, using a pen. They were painstakingly done and virtually every one was like a custom image. So, much easier to identify by somebody who knows what they’re looking for.”
Who’s most likely to find them? “The owners,” said Risley, “because they’ve got an interest, presumably, in getting them back, and presumably will do what they can to keep themselves aware of the various auctions at which these things come up for sale, if they do come up for sale.”
Has the Bluenose billionaire ever had one of his own Maud Lewis paintings stolen?
“Not that I know of, and I know that sounds like a curious answer,” said Risley, who with his partner, sold Clearwater in 2021 for $1 billion.
“But when I first started collecting these things back in the 1980s and the 1990s, I was pretty cavalier. I mean, you could buy paintings for $500 that now sell for $20,000 and $25,000, and I had a whole bunch of them all over the place. Did I do a good job of maintaining good inventory records? I mean, I’ve done that now, but I may have bought some paintings back 30 years ago which I can’t locate today.”
Risley’s pretty confident that the security he has now at his Nova Scotia homes in Halifax and Chester will keep his art collection safe. “You don’t get in and out of my houses without getting your picture taken several times.”
Risley loans a lot of his Maud Lewis artworks to museums.
“At any one point in time we’ve had as many as a 100 paintings out on loan to various museums, and we’re happy to do that,” he said. “There’s only so many I can look at any one point in time and I’m happy to share what I’ve got because they deserve to be shared.”
Risley attributes the “tremendous run up in prices” on Maud Lewis paintings to the 2016 movie Maudie, which starred Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke.
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“The movie did a lot to give her visibility,” he said.
“The McMichael, which is obviously one of Canada’s foremost galleries, had a big Maud Lewis show (that opened in June of 2019) and we lent them 85 or 90 paintings for that show, and it was the most visited show that they’ve had in their history.”
Risley can’t pick a favourite among his Maud Lewis collection.
“I’ve got a lot of things that she did which were pretty unique, like she painted scallop shells for instance,” he said.
One-offs like the shells and cut-out flowers Lewis painted “are amongst my favourite things.”
A Maud Lewis painting Risley’s father, Robert, bought directly from the artist in the late 1950s for $5 is also up there on his wealthy son’s list of most beloved artworks in his collection.
“I’ve still got that painting. So, that has to be amongst my favourites, just simply because of its history,” said Risley, 76.
“He only ever bought the one painting. He should have bought more,” the billionaire said of his dad with a chuckle.
Risley can’t peg the worth of his Maud Lewis collection.
“I didn’t buy it for financial gain, and when I’m not around, they’ll end up, hopefully in the new (Art Gallery of Nova Scotia),” said Risley, whose other business ventures include Ocean Nutrition Canada, a research and nutritional supplement company that specialized in omega-3 fatty acids and was later sold for nearly $600 million, and Columbus Communications, which started as a one-country cable company and eventually triggered two multibillion-dollar telecom mergers.
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Lewis, who sold her paintings by the side of the road outside her tiny Marshalltown, Digby County, home, died in 1970 at the age of 67. She was poor — her home had no insulation or indoor plumbing — and a bout of childhood rheumatoid arthritis had prevented her from developing a chin.
Risley — who showed up at every Maud Lewis auction for a quarter century and “always bought” what he wanted — suspects he’s got the largest collection of her paintings in the world.
“It’s a combination of her background and the hardships that she had to endure,” he said of their attraction.
“And the fact that her paintings are such happy paintings. How does a person living such a hard life, both physically and financially and materially, paint such happy paintings? I’ll say to people, look, I can have a room with a very, very expensive painting and a Maud Lewis in the room, and I’ll pay as much attention to the Maud Lewis as I will the very expensive painting because the Maud Lewis painting lights up the room…. You smile when you look at her work.”
While he was keen to talk about Nova Scotia’s favourite folk artist, Risley didn’t have much to say about his ongoing court battle with the Canada Revenue Agency over about $90 million in benefits the agency claims he received from his companies over two decades, but didn’t declare on his taxes.
“I’m not going to comment on that. That’s a matter before the courts and I’ve been told by my lawyers to keep my mouth shut,” he said.
“The courts are the arbiter of what’s fair, and I’m very confident that I can rely on Canada’s court system to deliver a fair result.”
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