Art worth €9m stolen from Renoir Museum on French Riviera

Thieves broke into a Renoir museum on the French Riviera and stole works of art worth €9 million ($10.5 million), the latest in a string of heists that has exposed security lapses at European galleries.

Two thieves dropped one of the four paintings as they fled the scene, the mayor of Cagnes-sur-Mer, where the museum is located, said in a statement on Facebook. Police arrived on site at 5:53 a.m. on Tuesday, five minutes after security alarms were triggered.

The artwork is valued at €9 million, Mayor Bryan Masson told local media.

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The theft will likely draw further scrutiny of security at French cultural institutions, a year after a $100 million heist of the Louvre in Paris. That theft in broad daylight embarrassed museum and government officials and prompted a 33-measure action plan from the cultural ministry.

In July, a 2,500-year-old gold necklace weighing around half a kilogram (1.1 pounds) was stolen from a museum in eastern France, after it was was targeted by two previous attempted robberies, Agence France-Presse reported. Thieves also made away earlier that month with €4.5 million worth of jewellery from the Lalique museum near Strasbourg, by the German border.

Museums in neighbouring countries have been targeted recently. Last month, 3 000-year-old bracelets, bowls and other pieces made mostly of gold were stolen from a museum in a medieval town in eastern Spain, and a Van Cleef & Arpels necklace valued at around $4 million  was stolen from a Vienna museum.

“Attacking the Renoir museum is attacking a part of Cagnes-sur-Mer’s history and cultural heritage,” Masson wrote on Facebook.

The museum is housed in the last home of impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir. Police are looking for the suspects.

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