On February 24, 2006, armed thieves stole four modern masterworks from the Museu da Chacara do Ceu in Rio de Janeiro: Salvador Dali's Man of Sickly Complexion Listening to the Sound of the Sea, Pablo Picasso's The Dance, Henri Matisse's Luxembourg Gardens, and Claude Monet's Marine. The theft unfolded during Carnival, when a nearby parade in Santa Teresa helped the robbers disappear into the crowd. Portuguese artwork entries for Monet's Marine and Picasso's The Dance independently tie the same theft to 24 February 2006 and identify the museum as the Castro Maya institution that had held the works. The case remains notable because it combined internationally famous artists, a public museum collection, and cultural-heritage protection failures during a major civic celebration.
The missing works became an enduring example of the vulnerability of public collections during mass events.
