Renoir, Cézanne, Matisse Paintings Stolen

Three valuable paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Cézanne, and Henri Matisse, with a combined worth of €9 million, were stolen from the Magnani-Rocca Foundation in Parma, Italy, on the night of March 22-23. Four masked thieves forced entry through a first-floor door, grabbed the artworks from the French Room, and escaped across the museum gardens in less than three minutes, triggering an alarm system that prevented further theft. The Italy — Carabinieri and the Cultural Heritage Protection Unit of Bologna are investigating the highly organized heist. This incident follows other high-profile art thefts in Europe, including a major heist at the Louvre in Paris last October, which may have inspired the perpetrators.