Thieves who stole priceless Renoir art 'wore helmets gloves and combat gear' and hacked through fence before creeping through gardens
The thieves ran off with Portrait Of Madame Colonna Romano and Young Woman At The Well but dropped two other artworks while escaping
Thieves who stole priceless Renoir paintings from a French gallery wore "helmets, gloves, and combat gear"and hacked through an electric fence before creeping into the museum's gardens.
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Two thieves broke into the museum dedicated to the impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir in a French Riviera town and stole four works of art worth an estimated £7.7m (€9 million).
A manhunt is underway for two thieves behind the break-in.
The mayor of Cagnes-sur-Mer, located in the south of France, said the group behind the raid were "well equipped" and "well informed".
Bryan Masson added that the group carried an "an electric knife and hacksaw" which they used to hack through an electric fence surrounding the museum gardens.
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Video footage shows them slashing through structures fixing the paintings' frames in place before fleeing with the artworks.
Mr Masson also confirmed that two paintings were abandoned in the museum gardens by the perpetrators.
They escaped with Portrait Of Madame Colonna Romano and Young Woman At the Well, local officials confirmed.
Cops also retrieved two zip-up bags that may belong to the offenders.
Mayor Bryan Masson, said: "We will dedicate all necessary resources to better protect this heritage, which belongs to all the residents of Cagnes."
Alarms at the museum were triggered just before 6am today local time.
The left-behind paintings were Portrait Of Madame Pichon (1895) and Coco Reading (1905), officials said.
The museum was created in 1960 in the mansion of the impressionist painter on a hill in Cagnes-sur-Mer, near Nice, where he died in 1919.
The collection on display in the museum includes 13 paintings from the master and some 40 sculptures, furniture and photographs.
Renoir's most valuable works have fetched dozens of millions of dollars at auctions in the past.
Art thieves in Europe are committing more and more robberies and specialist gangs have been replaced by ad hoc opportunists recruited through social media, according to Europol.
In a high-profile heist at the Louvre Museum in Paris in October last year thieves threatened guards and visitors and stole €88 million ($102.3 million) worth of jewels, including Empress Eugenie's tiara.