“Art theft is not a pretty picture – it’s a billion dollar business.”

For his recently published book Hot Art (Douglas and McIntyre, 2011), Canadian journalist Josh Knelman immersed himself for six years, in the fast-paced, secretive and thriving world of international art theft. While art theft is listed by Interpol and UNESCO as the fourth-largest black market in the world (Montreal alone accounts for $20 million annually), Knelman finds that there are only a handful of detectives, FBI agents and lawyers fighting the battle against art theft that spans every corner of the globe.