Paintings by Renoir, Cézanne and Matisse have been stolen from a private museum near the Italian city of Parma in the north of the country. According to a statement from the carabinieri (Italian police), four men entered the Magnani-Rocca Foundation, housed in a rural villa south of Parma, on 22 March to remove Les Poissons (1917) by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Still Life with Cherries (around 1890) by Paul Cézanne and Odalisque on the Terrace (1922) by Henri Matisse.
According to the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera, the hooded criminals entered by forcing open a door. According to a statement provided by the foundation to the newspaper, the thieves took less than three minutes to carry out the theft, partly because the alarm system was activated, forcing the gang to flee.
Together, the paintings have an estimated value of around 9 million euros, according to the BBC, the equivalent of around $10.3 million.
A police spokesperson told CNN that the museum chose to conceal the robbery from the public in hopes of catching the thieves if they returned.
No arrests have been made, and the museum has remained open for regular business hours. The incident is being investigated by Italy’s Carabinieri and the Cultural Heritage Protection Unit of Bologna.
The Magnani-Rocca Foundation is one of the most significant private art collections in Italy, housing works by artists such as Dürer, Titian, Rubens, Van Dyck, and Goya. It was founded in 1977 by the collector Luigi Magnani and opened to the public in 1990.
The crime comes after a series of high-profile heists at major European museums, including the theft in October of French crown jewels and other items worth 88 million euros ($101 million) from the Louvre in Paris. Italian art expert Claudio Strinati said the heist could be followed by a ransom request.