Windsor couple reports valuable artwork stolen from Petaluma storage unit

A break-in at a Petaluma storage unit left a Windsor couple without an estimated $50,000 to $100,000 worth of artwork.

Kristina Fogliani said her husband, Christian, received a Facebook message from a woman in the Bay Area Tuesday asking how much a painting by renowned artist Luke Chueh owned by the couple was worth. When Christian responded he would sell it to the woman for $4,000, the woman informed him that she already had the painting in her possession.

The couple raced to their storage locker in Petaluma at Public Storage on the 900 block of Transport Way, and discovered that it had been “ransacked,” Fogliani said.

“There was no signs of tampering. There was no sign that anyone had broken the lock, or cut the lock. That was the most confusing part of all,” she said. “Public Storage provided the lock for us. It was their lock.”

The indoor storage space was on the second floor of a temperature-?controlled building, and a code must be entered on a keypad to enter the building, Fogliani said.

A message left with Public Storage’s corporate office went unreturned Wednesday.

Fogliani reported the theft about ?3 p.m. Tuesday, telling police that ?dozens of original paintings were gone, worth an estimated $50,000, Petaluma Police Lt. Tim Lyons said. The police investigation is ongoing and the value of the paintings hadn’t been verified, he said.

Fogliani said that after reporting the theft to police, the couple made an inventory of all the stolen paintings, and determined 37 were missing. She said the value of the paintings was higher than what they had originally reported to police, reaching $75,000 to $100,000.

Christian Fogliani created an album on his Flickr page showing the paintings that had been stolen. The collection includes works by nationally renowned avant-garde artists like Mark Brown and Dave MacDowell, as well as international artists such as Japanese digital artist HR-FM and canvasses by street artist Blinky.

“This is not just minor stuff. This could be a felony, with the amount of (art) that was stolen,” she said.

Fogliani said that after making a Facebook post about the incident, she’s been contacted by multiple people that say they also had things stolen from lockers at Public Storage.

“It’s just been extremely mind-blowing, maddening, frustrating, all of the above. It’s really bad,” Fogliani said.

You can reach Staff Writer Andrew Beale at 707-521-5205 or andrew.beale@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @iambeale.