The musée Cantini building was built in 1694 for the Compagnie du Cap Nègre, , specializing in coral fishing on the northern coasts of Tunisia[1] and in the trade of wool, wax and leather.

[citation needed] The Musée Cantini has one of the largest public collections in France of the 1900–1980 period,[5] along with a few earlier works such as the 1756 The Expeditionary Corps Embarks for Minorca at the Port of Marseille Under the Command of Marshal de Richelieu.

A wide variety of artists is represented, including Charles Camoin, Raoul Dufy, Albert Gleizes, Henri Laurens, Wassily Kandinsky, František Kupka, Jean Hélion, Alberto Magnelli, Amédée Ozenfant, Max Ernst, André Masson, Simon Simon-Auguste, Jacques Thévenet, Victor Brauner, Joan Miró, Jean Arp.

In 2009, the museum was exhibiting Edgar Degas's pastel on monotype Les Choristes, on loan from the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.

It was stolen at the end of the year; the investigation went cold until 2018, when customs officers recovered it from the luggage compartment of a bus outside Paris.