Burglars were filmed breaking into a museum, near Nice, on Tuesday morning and cut four paintings worth £10million from their frames before fleeing - the criminals dropped two artworks as they left09:03, 08 Sep 2026Updated 14:49, 08 Sep 2026Thieves have stolen at least four paintings by the French impressionist August Renoir worth around £10million from a museum in the south of France.‌Burglars were filmed breaking into the Renoir museum in Cagnes-sur-Mer, near Nice, on Tuesday morning. A source investigating the theft said: "The alarm sounded at 5.48am, and two hooded individuals were recorded on CCTV." Two of the artworks were dropped by the thieves in the museum gardens as they fled the scene.‌The men were seen cutting the paintings from their frames, to make them easier to get out of the allegedly high-security building.‌One of the paintings found abandoned in the museum garden was Portrait of Madame Stephen Pichon, from 1895. The second dropped painting was Coco Lisant – Coco Reading – which is a portrait of the artist's young son, completed in 1905.The two paintings that were missing are Madame Colonna Romano, painted in 1910, and Jeune femme au puits – The Young Woman at the Well – which Renoir painted in 1886.‌The Mayor of Cagnes, Bryan Masson, told reporters outside the museum the thieves were armed with a "knife and a hacksaw" and cut a hole through the fence to get onto the museumk grounds. He added that the sound of police sirens caused the thieves to flee "by running in the gardens".‌Mayor Masson said: "The two individuals were filmed running away by the town's video surveillance cameras. They abandoned one of the paintings as they ran." He added that police made it to the scene five minutes after the alarm sounded, at 5.53am, and cops were pictured outside the museum into the morning.He added: "The perpetrators are being actively sought, and the investigation is ongoing. Attacking the Renoir Museum is attacking a part of the history and heritage of #CagnesSurMer. These events are particularly serious.‌"They also confirm the urgent need to implement the comprehensive plan to secure our museums and protect our works of art, a plan to which I have committed. We will dedicate all necessary resources to better protect this heritage, which belongs to all the residents of Cagnes."This comes months after the notorious Louvre heist where a group of thieves, disguised as workmen, broke into the iconic museum's Apollo Gallery and ran off with £75 million worth of crown jewels. The gang scaled up the gallery with a cherry picker and smashed the glass into the room, in October 2025.‌The robbers took just seven minutes to carry out the brazen heist and took eight items, including a necklace that Napoleon I gave to his second wife Marie Louise. Four suspected Louvre robbers were arrested by police but not all of the stolen items have been recovered.Thieves in the Louvre heist also dropped one of the stolen items as they fled - a crown of French Empress Eugenie which was crushed but recovered.Just three Renoir paintings would be worth at least £10million on the open market, according to art experts. Massively popular Renoir works displayed in the Cagnes museum include La Ferme des Collettes, which is titled The Farm at Les Collettes, in English.‌The oil on canvas piece was completed in 1915, and depicts the place Renoir moved to in 1908. The Renoir Museum, which opened in 1960, is housed in the site depicted in the painting, and was displayed in what was once Renoir's bedroom. There is a similar work in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.The Renoir museum holds range of the artist's belongings in the collection, including his furniture, wheelchair and easel. Renoir's full name was Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and he was born in Limoges in France in 1841, before his family moved to Paris. He became one of the world's most famous painters and many of his works are held in England, including at the National Gallery in London.Article continues belowHis Dans les roses (In the Roses) was sold by Sotheby’s in May 2003 for £17million, while Les Deux Souers (The Two Sisters) went for around £5million in 2007. Renoir died on his estate at Cagnes in December 1919, at the age of 78.