CAGNES-SUR-MER, France — Thieves cut through a garden fence before dawn, entered the former home of Pierre-Auguste Renoir and removed four paintings. Police were at the museum within minutes—but by then the intruders had fled, leaving two of the stolen works behind in the garden.
Two paintings are still missing after the September 8 break-in at the Renoir Museum on the French Riviera: Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano and Woman at the Well. Authorities have not announced any arrests.
The speed of the robbery, the cultural importance of the missing works and the recovery of half the haul have turned the case into another closely watched test of security at European museums.
An alarm at 5:48 a.m.
The museum’s alarm was triggered at 5:48 a.m. Tuesday, according to the Associated Press. Police arrived about five minutes later.
Investigators believe the thieves entered the property by cutting through the garden fence with a powered tool. Once inside the ground floor, they cut or forced the clips securing the paintings to their mounts and removed four works.
Cagnes-sur-Mer Mayor Bryan Masson described the intruders as well equipped and apparently well informed. Surveillance footage identified two people entering the museum, AP reported.
The quick police response appears to have disrupted the escape. Two paintings were found abandoned in the museum garden, while the other two disappeared with the thieves. The museum was temporarily closed as investigators examined the property.
The two Renoirs still missing
Reuters identified the missing works as Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano and Woman at the Well, both associated with France’s national museum collections and displayed at Renoir’s former estate.
Their histories make the loss especially striking. The Musée d’Orsay catalogue dates Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano to about 1913. The oil painting was recovered in Germany after World War II and placed in the custody of France’s national museums in 1950.
Woman at the Well, an unfinished oil painting on wood dating to around 1886, was also recovered in Germany after the war and entrusted to the national museums, in its case in 1951.
Officials have not publicly confirmed the value of the two works that remain missing. Early reports circulated estimates for the group of paintings, but the scope of those estimates was unclear. The safer measure of the loss is historical: both objects had already survived a complicated journey before arriving at Renoir’s last home.
Why the museum matters
The Renoir Museum occupies the Domaine des Collettes, the hillside estate where the Impressionist painter spent the final years of his life. The municipal museum’s official description says its collection includes original artworks, photographs, letters, archives, ceramics, furniture and personal objects connected to Renoir and his family.
That setting is part of the attraction. Visitors do not encounter the paintings in a conventional urban gallery; they see them at the property where Renoir lived and worked, surrounded by the landscape of Cagnes-sur-Mer near Nice.
It also presents a difficult security problem. Historic homes were not designed as modern vaults, yet they may hold globally significant works and must remain accessible to the public.
A theft that raises a larger question
The burglars’ identities and motive remain unknown, and authorities have not said whether the paintings were stolen for resale, ransom or a private buyer. Famous works are difficult to sell openly because their provenance is instantly recognizable, but that has not stopped thieves from targeting museums.
For now, investigators have two recovered paintings, surveillance footage and a narrow timeline. What they do not have are the two Renoirs that vanished beyond the garden.
The robbery lasted only minutes. Recovering the final two works could take far longer.
