Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts is swapping a few impressionist works for a Caillebotte because it is a rare impressionist male nude.

The Museum of Fine Arts plans to buy a masterpiece by the Impressionist painter Gustave Caillebotte called “Man at His Bath,’’ but to raise the funds it will sell eight paintings from its collection, including works by Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, and Auguste Renoir. The works, valued at between $16.6 million and $24.3 million, were all gifts to the MFA. […] The Caillebotte painting is from a private foundation and has been on loan to the National Gallery in London since the later 1990s. […]

The Caillebotte, which has been hanging on loan in the MFA’s Impressionist Galleries since late April […]

The Sotheby’s estimates suggest the Monet, a view across water of the fort at Antibes, will fetch $5 million to $7 million. […]

The next-highest estimate, $3 million to $5 million, is for a monumental painting, “Pearl Mosque, Delhi,’’ by the highly regarded Russian artist Vasily Vereshchagin. The other six paintings are valued at between $300,000 and $3 million.

For Masterpiece, MFA Will Sell Eight in Collection (Boston Globe)