Renoir Museum painting heist France September 2026
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Museum thefts becoming bolder across Europe
Thieves stole four paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir from a French museum in September 2026.
Art detective Arthur Brand predicted to the BBC that more high-profile burglaries were likely before the Renoir heist.
In the Renoir case, perpetrators used an electric knife to cut through a fence before sawing through structures holding the paintings' frames in place.
Renoir paintings stolen in French museum heist
The two missing paintings are Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano (1910) and Jeune fille au puits (1886).
Two paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir were stolen from a museum in the south of France.
The two recovered paintings are Portrait of Madame Pichon (1895) and Coco Lisant (1905).
Three paintings worth $10 million stolen from Renoir Museum in France
Fox News reported that thieves dropped two of the four stolen paintings in the garden and escaped with two.
French newspaper Nice-Matin identified the four paintings taken as 'Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano,' 'Coco Lisant' and 'Young Girl at the Well,' and valued the stolen works at about $10.5 million.
Europol said that art robberies in Europe have grown more violent and that some thefts once carried out by specialist gangs are now being committed by opportunists recruited through social media.