Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Theft

On March 18, 1990, two men in police uniforms rang the intercom at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and said they were responding to a disturbance. A guard let them in through the employee entrance. At the thieves' direction, he stepped away from the security desk, and he and a second guard were taken to the basement and restrained.

Motion detectors recorded the thieves' movements as they made their way to the galleries. In the Dutch Room on the second floor, they cut Rembrandt's Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee and A Lady and Gentleman in Black from their frames, removed Vermeer's The Concert and Flinck's Landscape with an Obelisk from theirs, pulled an ancient Chinese bronze gu, or beaker, from a table, and took a small Rembrandt self-portrait etching from the side of a chest. In the Short Gallery, also on the second floor, they took five Degas works and a bronze eagle finial. One floor down, in the Blue Room, they took Manet's Chez Tortoni.

The thieves left at 2:45 am after two trips to their car. The FBI puts their time inside at 81 minutes. The two guards stayed handcuffed until police arrived at 8:15 am. The FBI valued the 13 works at more than $500 million at the time and calls the theft the largest property crime in U.S. history.

What the FBI has said

The FBI says the 13 works were separated after the robbery and could be anywhere in the world, with several pieces believed to have moved along the Eastern seaboard through the Mid-Atlantic states and down south.

On March 18, 2013, the 23rd anniversary of the theft, Richard DesLauriers, the special agent in charge of the FBI's Boston office, said the bureau believed "with a high degree of confidence" that the art had been taken to Connecticut and the Philadelphia region, and that some of it was offered for sale in Philadelphia by those responsible. He added, "With that same confidence we have identified the thieves who are members of a criminal organization with a base in the mid-Atlantic states and New England." The FBI did not name them. The Boston Globe reported in March 2026 that none of the works had been recovered and no one had been charged.

The same day, US Attorney Carmen Ortiz said her office would consider immunity from criminal prosecution for information that leads to the return of the paintings.

The museum offers a reward. The FBI's Seeking Information page says the museum, which it describes as a non-governmental organization, "is offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the safe return of the stolen artwork in good condition," and that the FBI has no involvement in administering it.

The empty frames

The thieves left the frames behind. Four Dutch Room frames, from the two Rembrandts, the Vermeer, and the Flinck, were left on the gallery floor with minor damage, and Holly Salmon, the museum's director of conservation, writes that the thieves were presumably trying to make the paintings easier to transport. The Manet frame was left in a security office on the opposite side of the building. The museum says nobody knows why, or why the thieves removed it from so small a painting at all.

The museum repaired all five frames and returned them to the gallery walls as placeholders "in the hope that the stolen paintings will, one day, return to them." The FBI's history page dates the display of the empty frames to 1994. Anthony Amore, the museum's director of security, told CBS Boston in December 2017 that the frames are "a message to the public that we're never going to forget these paintings."

Six of the 13 works came from the Dutch Room, which the museum is now restoring. Its restoration page says that by early 2027 the room will be "ready to welcome back the stolen works when they someday return (we hope and believe) to their rightful home."

The Manet frame. The frame from Chez Tortoni was left in a security office, on the opposite side of the building from the Dutch Room frames. The museum says nobody knows why it was left there, or why it was taken off such a small painting at all.

The cut and removed canvases. The museum's account says the thieves cut the two Rembrandt oils from their frames and removed the Vermeer and the Flinck from theirs. Its director of conservation, Holly Salmon, writes that the four Dutch Room frames sustained minor damage when cast aside.

The route. The thieves took works from three rooms on two floors: the Dutch Room and the Short Gallery on the second floor, and the Blue Room on the first. Motion detectors recorded their movements, and the museum's Audio Walk retraces them.

Where the FBI thinks the art went. The FBI said in 2013 that it did not know where the art was and was continuing its search "both in and beyond the Connecticut and Philadelphia areas."

The immunity offer. On March 18, 2013, US Attorney Carmen Ortiz said her office would consider "the possibility of immunity from criminal prosecution" for information that leads to the return of the paintings.

The museum is closed Tuesdays. It opens 11am to 5pm on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 11am to 9pm on Thursday, and 10am to 5pm on Saturday and Sunday. Thursday nights from 5 to 9pm are free, with tickets released 2 days ahead. Advance tickets are recommended because popular entry times sell out. Adult admission was $25 in October 2026, and children 17 and under are free.

The galleries carry no wall labels, because Isabella Stewart Gardner placed every object herself and the museum does not use conventional ones. It offers a free Audio Walk, narrated by Anthony Amore with chief curator Nathaniel Silver, that retraces the thieves' route and describes what the loss changed in the galleries. Free Wi-Fi and QR codes are in every gallery, and headphones are recommended. Non-flash photos and video are welcome for personal enjoyment but not for commercial use, and bags need to be 12 by 12 by 3 inches or smaller to go into the galleries.

The museum's own list places the frames of the two Rembrandt oils, the Vermeer, and the Flinck in the Dutch Room on the second floor, and the Manet frame in the Blue Room on the first. The Dutch Room stays open during its restoration, and the frames left behind after the theft are among the pieces being treated, so which frames hang on which wall may change from one visit to the next.