Stealing a $150,000 Dalí Is a Lot Easier Than You Think

Anyone who's ever seen The Thomas Crown Affair knows that pulling off an art heist is best handled by experts, but that's not what happened on the Upper East Side where some balding man grabbed a six-figure Salvador Dalí painting on a Tuesday afternoon and walked off with it.

Anyone who's ever seen The Thomas Crown Affair knows that pulling off an art heist is best handled by experts, but that's not what happened on the Upper East Side where some balding man grabbed a six-figure Salvador Dalí painting on a Tuesday afternoon and walked off with it. As The New York Daily News' Rocco Parascandola and Sarah Argmaghan report, Dalí's Cartel des Don Juan Tenorio (right), was stolen from the Venus Over Manhattan Art Gallery in what seems like the world's easiest heist: "As soon as the guard stepped away, the man removed the 1949 work by the famed Surrealist and dropped it into a large black shopping bag." Police are still looking for the thief (video below).

There's no doubt that Adam Lindemann, The New York Observer columnist/art collector who owns the gallery, probably needs a new security system. But just remember that this isn't the first time pieces of art have been stolen, though it's probably the most casually executed. Versions of Edvard Munch's Scream have a history of being ripped off walls and stolen: once in 1994 and again in 2004. And just last week, an original Picasso was defaced in Houston, reports ABC News. If there's anything gleaned here, it's that that the "velvet-rope" and "don't get too close" security system isn't really ideal.