In Chap­ter 11 of “The Art Thief,” the psy­cho­log­i­cal exam­i­na­tion of Bre­itwieser sheds light on his moti­va­tions and men­tal state. Diag­nosed with nar­cis­sis­tic and anti­so­cial per­son­al­i­ty dis­or­ders, he shows a warped per­cep­tion of real­i­ty regard­ing his art thefts. Despite under­go­ing ther­a­py ses­sions and tests, includ­ing those by psy­chol­o­gist Schmidt, his behav­ior is deemed out of touch with soci­etal norms. Schmidt high­lights that Bre­itwieser believes him­self to be a seer of true beau­ty, feel­ing enti­tled to take art regard­less of legal­i­ty, as he per­ceives his actions as vic­tim­less since he avoids per­son­al res­i­dences and vio­lence.

Breitwieser’s accom­plice, Anne-Cather­ine, was eval­u­at­ed by psy­chol­o­gist César Redon­do, who not­ed her vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty to manip­u­la­tion, sug­gest­ing she had been drawn into Bre­itwieser’s activ­i­ties with­out the strength to resist. Both psy­chol­o­gists agreed that he is ful­ly aware of the moral­i­ty of his actions. Brun­ner, anoth­er psy­chol­o­gist, con­firmed that Bre­itwieser’s behav­ior can­not be clin­i­cal­ly clas­si­fied as a psy­cho­log­i­cal ill­ness, stat­ing that theft itself is not an indi­ca­tor of men­tal ill­ness, despite its roots in his per­son­al­i­ty.

Bre­itwieser main­tains his jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for theft through a his­tor­i­cal lens, claim­ing that the lega­cy of art is filled with sto­ries of plun­der and own­er­ship dis­putes. He cites exam­ples like the Hors­es of Saint Mark, trac­ing their tumul­tuous his­to­ry across sev­er­al empires, assert­ing that art theft has been a nar­ra­tive through­out his­to­ry. For him, each stolen piece rein­forces his belief that the art world is rife with decep­tion and thiev­ery; he per­ceives him­self mere­ly as a par­tic­i­pant in this long-stand­ing tra­di­tion.

Ulti­mate­ly, the chap­ter presents Bre­itwieser as a com­plex character—viewed by some as a sim­plis­tic thief dri­ven by enti­tle­ment and oth­ers as a mis­un­der­stood fig­ure amidst a cor­rupt art world. His relent­less pur­suit of art, dri­ven by a mix of exhil­a­ra­tion and thrill, posi­tions him in stark con­trast to soci­etal norms, reveal­ing the lay­ers of per­son­al jus­ti­fi­ca­tion behind his ille­gal actions in the art indus­try .