Chez Tortoni

Chez Tortoni (c. 1875) is a small oil painting by Édouard Manet depicting an elegantly dressed gentleman seated alone at a table in the celebrated Café Tortoni in Paris. The unidentified figure appears absorbed in sketching or writing on a pad, while a half-finished glass of beer rests beside him. With its loose brushwork, intimate scale, and quiet atmosphere, the painting captures a fleeting moment of modern Parisian café life, one of Manet's signature subjects. The painting became one of the world's most famous missing artworks after it was stolen during the 1990 Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum heist in Boston, when two thieves disguised as police officers made off with 13 works of art. Chez Tortoni remains missing today, and it is among the masterpieces covered by the museum's standing $10 million reward for information leading to the recovery of the stolen works. dims: 10 in × 13 in