Picasso's "The Painter": Lost in a Plane Crash

This signed 1963 Collotype called "Le Peintre" (The Painter), by famed artist Pablo Picasso, was lost in the crash of Swissair Flight 111 off Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada on September 2, 1998. In addition to this painting, which was valued at about one-and-a-half million dollars, the plane's shipment also contained almost a half a billion dollars worth of precious diamonds and other jewels.

En route from JFK airport in New York City to Geneva, Switzerland, the pilots sent a distress signal and were attempting to make an emergency landing in Nova Scotia when the plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, killing all two hundred and twenty-nine souls on board. Though ninety-eight percent of the plane was recovered from the water, only about twenty centimeters of the Picasso work were located, and the jewels were nowhere to be found. (Link | Photo)