Four paintings taken from Rio's Chácara do Céu

On Friday 24 February 2006, at about four in the afternoon, four armed men walked into the Museu da Chácara do Céu in Santa Teresa, a hillside district of Rio de Janeiro. The museum was once the home of the collector Raymundo Ottoni de Castro Maya, and it belongs to Brazil’s federal museum system. Outside, a street party called the Bloco das Carmelitas was filling the streets for the start of Carnival, and traffic had stopped. The museum was due to close for the festival one hour later. Folha de S.Paulo, a Brazilian daily, reports that the director, Vera de Alencar, had sent staff home early and was not in the building.

Folha reports, from police and museum accounts, that the men made the guards switch off the CCTV and held staff and visitors in one room. They threatened to use a grenade and took visitors’ cameras. Reports differ on how many people were held. Folha counted five tourists and five guards. Later reports, in Agência Brasil and The Art Newspaper, say about nine people.

The FBI lists four paintings. They were Claude Monet’s Marine, Henri Matisse’s Le Jardin du Luxembourg, Salvador Dalí’s Les Deux Balcons and Pablo Picasso’s La Danse. The museum dates the Matisse to 1903 and the FBI to 1905. The men also smashed a display case and took Toros, a book of Picasso prints. Folha reports that a guard tried to pull the Picasso away and that it was torn. The museum had been robbed before. In 1989 the Matisse and the Dalí were taken and later recovered.

Because of the party, police were slow to arrive. Agência Brasil says the first patrol took about half an hour. The Art Newspaper says the men left on foot and vanished into the crowd. Folha reported that the Federal Police traced a van driver, who said the thieves forced him to carry them. He was held and freed for lack of evidence. On 2 March, after an anonymous tip, police found burned frame pieces near the museum. Folha reported that the museum first named the Picasso frame, then said they were the frames of the Matisse, Picasso and Monet. The same day, the Matisse was offered on a Russian online-auction site with a bid of 13 million dollars. A police chief thought it was a ruse.

Estimates of the value differ. The New York Times said at least 20 million dollars, and The Art Newspaper says more than 10 million. CBN, a Brazilian radio network, says 50 million. None of the works has been sold at auction, so there is no price. No one has been charged. The Art Newspaper reports that police looked at a small group of French nationals linked to the art world, with no proof. Agência Brasil reports that the case file vanished in 2014 and was found at the end of 2015. Federal prosecutors told it the main case was provisionally archived for lack of a named suspect.

The statute of limitations ran out on 23 February 2026, after 20 years. Nobody can now be punished for the robbery. The Art Newspaper reports that the works still belong to the museum and must be returned if found. The Brazilian register of missing museum objects lists the Matisse as not located. The Art Newspaper said on 5 March 2026 that none of the works had been recovered. Veja Rio, citing the federal museum agency Ibram, reported on 3 April 2026 that they remain on the missing list.