Aboriginal art worth over $100,000 stolen from Vancouver gallery Over $100,000 worth of aboriginal artwork, including a piece by well-known Musqueam artist Susan Point, have been stolen from a downtown Vancouver gallery and the police are looking for the public's help. Nine pieces of artwork were stolen from the Coastal Peoples Fine Arts Gallery in Gastown between the night of October 30 and the morning of October 31. Pieces included original aboriginal sculptures, wood panels and masks. Gallery owner Svetlana Fouks said she is appreciative of the police effort to recover the artwork. "We're working closely with the police at this point to see if we can locate the pieces," said Ms. Fouks. We're hoping to have a successful resolution. The art was being kept in a storage locker at the time of the break-in. Among the stolen pieces was a print by Ms. Point entitled Where the Ocean Meets the Sky and valued at $1,500, according to information on the gallery's website. Ms. Point's other work includes public installations at Vancouver International Airport, Stanley Park and the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. Information surrounding the break-in was released to the public over three weeks after the break-in. Montague said investigators would have tried alternate tactics to recover the artwork before issuing the news release Friday morning. "This is not something that we do for everything," he said. We chose crimes that would be important and help in the investigation rather than just merely putting the information out for interest sake. This is not the first time artwork from high-profile aboriginal artists has been stolen in Vancouver. In May 2008, 15 items were stolen from Vancouver's Museum of Anthropology. Twelve of the items were created by renowned Haida artist Bill Reid. Eleven of Mr. Reid's pieces were made of solid gold. Police had estimated their value at around $2-million. A month after the break-in, some of the items, including several of Mr. Reid's artworks, were found by the RCMP during Lower Mainland raids. The pieces were recovered intact. The Vancouver Police Department is hoping that information from the public may also result in recovery of the pieces stolen from the Coastal Peoples Fine Arts Gallery in October. The unique nature of the artwork may attract attention, said Const. Montague. "We're not talking about mass manufactured items," he said. We're talking one-of-a-kind pieces that could be difficult to sell or to fence or get rid of. All of the items are very unique. So we're hoping that somebody out there has some information that will be helpful to us. Anyone with information about this theft, or who knows the location of any of the artwork, is asked to call the Vancouver Police Department at (604) 717-9049.