Italian police recover stolen Renoir, Cézanne and Matisse artworks worth millions

Paintings by Renoir, Cézanne and Matisse worth over $10.4 million (€8.9 million) which were stolen from an Italian museum in March have been recovered, Italian police said on Friday.

The paintings were taken by thieves from the villa of the Magnani-Rocca Foundation, near Parma in northern Italy, in a heist that lasted under three minutes.

Parma chief of police Andrea Pagliaro said the investigation centred around a gang of nine Moldovan suspects.

Five are accused of carrying out the theft, he said.

Video footage released by police showed two thieves wearing headlamps and with their faces covered entering the villa by breaking through a window.

They headed straight into a room where the three paintings hung and took them off the wall, before heading back to the window and passing them through to an accomplice waiting outside.

They made off with "Fish" by Auguste Renoir, "Still Life with Cherries" by Paul Cézanne and "Odalisque on the Terrace" by Henri Matisse.

The Renoir is worth €3 million, the Cézanne €6 million and the Matisse around €20,000, police said.

The paintings were recovered at the house of one of the suspects, police chief Pagliaro told the AFP news agency.

The Magnani-Rocca Foundation, 20 kilometres from Parma, houses the collection of art historian Luigi Magnani, which also includes works by Durer, Rubens, Van Dyck, Goya and Monet.

The theft is the latest in a series of robberies targeting European museums.

Last October, thieves broke into the Louvre in Paris in broad daylight, escaping in less than eight minutes with jewellery worth €88 million.