25 January 2023
Restitution is proving to be a complex and challenging problem for many museums and private collections. This week alone, several cases have been filed. Reputations that were once beyond question have now been brought into question.
UK Culture Secretary Jeremy Wright has vowed to protect objects on loan from abroad in temporary exhibitions in UK museums from seizure by the UK courts.
A new bill to speed up the return of artwork stolen by the Nazis during WWII has passed the US Senate after its approval in the House of Representatives last week.
Two of the most famous paintings in the world, 16th-century panels depicting Adam & Eve by Lucas Cranach the Elder are to remain at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena after a ten-year restitution battle. The artworks were looted by Nazis from art dealer Jacques Goudstikker, who died fleeing his home country. They were then sold to Adolf […]
The US Supreme Court has rejected an appeal for the return of a Vincent Van Gogh masterpiece “The Night Cafe” from the descendants of a Russian collector who claim that the painting was stolen from them by the State, following the 1917 Revolution. The Supreme Court decision is the last chance saloon of the case for Frenchman Pierre Konowaloff’s legal […]
A painting by the French Fauvist artist Henri Matisse of the Artist Greta Moll is at the centre of a dispute, at London’s National Gallery. The institution has been threatened with legal action relating to the painting, which was purchased over 36 years ago. The family claims that it was stolen from its original owner, shortly after the second world […]
Charles Goldstein – a New York real estate lawyer describes as a ‘tenacious advocate’ for recovering art looted from Holocaust victims.
The German Government has approved funds for a center to search for and return art looted by the Nazis. The culture minister Monika Grütters has laid out the government’s intentions, stating that ‘Germany has a responsibility to find works stolen from across Europe during the 1930s and 1940s’. Grütters pointed out that the public outcry […]
The Badische Landesmuseum in Karlsruhe, Germany has recently announced that it has identified seven works of art within its collection, that were originally looted by the Nazi’s during World War II. The six paintings and one sculpture had been hidden from public view in one of the museum’s warehouses for the last 70 years. Katharina […]
On November 5th, Christie’s is auctioning a 1910 Schiele watercolor ‘Town on the Blue River’. The auction house is doing this in conjunction with a restitution agreement that views the work as looted art, and will provide compensation to Grünbaum’s heirs. Sotheby’s, is offering a 1917 goauche and crayon on paper, ‘Seated Woman With Bent […]
The Gustav Klimt painting of Gertrud Loew is at the centre of an ongoing ownership dispute that may be resolved in the artwork’s sale, reports Reuters. There have been several high-profile restitution disputes in recent years. The Nazi party’s systematic looting of art has become not only more contentious than ever, but also bigger business. […]
The confiscated collection of Nazi era art belonging Cornelius Gurlitt has gone on display to selected media in Germany.
A stolen Gustav Klimt painting worth £26m that was confiscated by the Nazis must be returned to the heirs of a Canadian Jewish family. It has been in the collection of a well known Austrian museum (the Museum of Modern Arts in Saltburg) for decades but under restitution laws is set to return to the […]