Current affairs on the restitution of looted art from World War II.

During World War II, art in Europe was unlawfully appropriated on a large scale. Many Jewish victims were forced to sell their art at extremely low prices, or it was outright stolen. Numerous art objects also disappeared from museums in occupied countries. This article examines the current affairs surrounding these objects. Even though they were taken around seventy-five years ago, the restitution remains a hot topic. It is estimated that about one hundred thousand to six hundred thousand paintings and millions of books, religious objects and other cultural goods, have not been returned to their rightful owners. High-profile lawsuits about restitution are regularly filed, and heirs continue to submit requests for the return of cultural goods. 

Historical Context

During Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist regime from 1933 to 1945, art was looted on a large scale. This often targeted Jewish owners. Appropriation occurred in various forms. Sometimes art was confiscated or stolen, but owners could also be forced by circumstances to sell art for prices that were way too low. Such circumstances included disproportionate tax measures aimed at the Jewish population and dubious accusations of tax fraud. Jewish businesses also faced severe threats and destruction. The looting of art was not random. During the German occupation, there was a special looting organization called the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, led by Alfred Rosenberg (an influential member of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP)). The organization systematically plundered art collections. It is estimated that one-fifth of all the world’s art treasures were looted, amounting to approximately 2.5 billion dollars, or over 2.2 billion euros. Around one hundred thousand artworks disappeared from France. Sixty percent of these were recovered after the war, and seventy-five percent of those found their way back to their rightful owners.

‘The Graces in the Gardens of the Hesperides’ by Peter Paul Rubens. Stolen during organized thefts led by Alfred Rosenberg and recovered at the end of the war.

Art played an important role in Hitlers’ Third Reich, and the cultural world was heavily influenced by extensive censorship. Art and good taste were crucial for the image of the German Reich as the pinnacle of civilization. A clear distinction was made between entartete (‘degenerate’) art which did not meet the requirements of the National Socialist regime, and art that did fall under the Nazi-defined category of aesthetically and morally correct “Aryan” art. For example, art created by Jewish artists and abstract or modern art were considered entart. For this reason, about 16,000 artworks were removed from German museums. “Aryan” art often had various destinations. High-ranking SS officers or ministers received art, but some pieces were intended for the planned Führermuseum.

Returns after World War II

Given these circumstances, the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives Section Unit (MFAA) was established during World War II by the Allies, with the aim of tracking and securing looted art at the end of the war. This organization found 6,500 art objects in the salt mines of Austria. Additionally, the Allies made agreements about the artworks that had ended up in Germany. These were to be returned to the countries from which they came – if known – in order to be given back to their rightful owners – again, if known.

There are many circumstances that contribute to the difficulty of tracing the provenance of paintings. In many cases, the rightful owners died or were murdered during World War II. Many archives were also destroyed as the war neared its end. Additionally, it must be proven that the objects were unlawfully appropriated. Requests for the return of paintings by (heirs of) the rightful owners are therefore not always successful. Another reason is that in certain countries civil law, including limitation periods, was applicable. The claim for restitution had therefore expired after a certain period, meaning it was no longer valid.

Gold from the Reichsbank, SS loot, and paintings in a salt mine in Merkers, Germany on April 15, 1945. Photo by the MFAA.

International Attention

In 1998, a conference about dealing with Nazi-looted art was held. The aim of this conference was to discuss Jewish losses, including artworks, books, archives, insurance claims, and other types of property. The conference resulted in the ‘Washington Principles on Nazi-Confiscated Art’, named after the location of the meeting. Forty-four countries endorsed the document. It called for ‘the identification and publication of Nazi-looted art, open and accessible archives for researchers, a restitution policy based on fairness and equity, and a form of alternative dispute resolution’. This alternative form of dispute resolution led to the establishment of restitution committees in five countries.

The Washington Principles were supplemented in 2009 by the ‘Terezin Declaration on Holocaust Era Assets and Related Issues’, which provided further guidelines for rectifying economic injustices during the Holocaust. The declaration noted areas for improvement and highlighted the moral responsibilities stemming from the non-binding document. On the 25th anniversary of the Washington Principles, the ‘Best Practices for the Washington Principles on Nazi-Confiscated Art’ document was drafted, further detailing the original principles. It specifies that the preferred fair and equitable solution is restitution, alongside other fair and equitable solutions. According to the new document, “Nazi looting” refers to ‘art that was confiscated, sequestered and spoliated by the Nazis, the Fascists, and their collaborators through various means including theft, coercion and confiscation, and on grounds of relinquishment as well as forced sales and sales under duress, during the Holocaust era between 1933 and 1945 and as an immediate consequence’. Quite a mouthful. The bottom line is that something can also qualify as nazi-looting if it was carried out by fascists or collaborators, and that ‘theft’ can take place in several ways. For example, forced sales under pressure from collaborators can therefore also fall under this category.

Progress after the Washington Principles

Recently, a report was released by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (Claims Conference) and the World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO) on the implementation of the Washington Principles. The report concludes that many countries have conducted at least some historical research on Nazi-looted art, resulting in a more accurate picture of this issue. However, many museums still fail to investigate the provenance of objects in their collections, and this is often not seen as an essential part of museum management. Additionally, only a few countries have established restitution committees, indicating that there is still room for improvement in many nations. Another area where progress can be made is in provenance research within private collections.

The table below shows the progress made by the countries that are parties to the Principles, according to the report. It evaluates whether countries conduct historical research projects, perform provenance research, have a claims process or restitution committee, and carry out a significant number of restitutions. For example, Denmark and Albania score zero points, while seven top-performing countries check all the boxes. Whether or not the Holocaust took place in the respective country does not seem to be decisive in the question of whether the Principles are better adhered to there.

The report discusses the situation by country. One of those countries is Belarus. There, it mentions that  a Soviet convoy with fifty four freight cars transported about 1.2 million books to Minsk in the fall of 1945. Over a third of these books came from France and other European countries. The largest number of these looted books is still in the hands of the National Library of Belarus in Minsk. 

As for Portugal, there is hardly any provenance research and it is unknown whether there have been any restitution requests. It is known, however, that artists, art dealers and collectors entered the country between 1940 and 1945, some for longer periods than others. There is also strong evidence that existing trade routes that passed through Portugal were used to smuggle art. One can think of the pharmaceutical trade between Portugal and Latin America. A well-known example is the ship S.S. Excalibur, which was seized by British authorities in Bermuda in October 1940. On board were rare books and some five hundred (post-)impressionist paintings. The person who had obtained the artworks in Lisbon, Martin Fabiani (a French art dealer), was found guilty of collaborating with the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg. The paintings were kept at the National Gallery of Canada during the war and were returned to their rightful owners after the war.

About Germany it is written that since the implementation of the Washington Principles, the authorities have returned more than 7,455 Nazi looted art objects from museums. On the other hand, only 242 of the 7,120 museums conduct provenance investigations, which amounts to less than five percent. Also, the overall numbers of restitutions – viewed relative to restitution requests, for example – is very low. Furthermore, while an advisory committee has been established, museums are not required to cooperate. This can lead to lopsided situations, for example in the case of Picasso’s painting Madame Soler. The Mendelssohn-Bartholdy family has been asking for restitution for 10 years and also addressed it to administrative bodies of the state of Bavaria, but the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen refuses to appeal to the advisory body. 

In 2022 in Israel, the Israel Museum in Jerusalem was sued by heirs of Holocaust victims over the rare and precious Birds’ Head Haggadah that had belonged to the museum’s collection since 1946. The lawsuit was likely the last restitution case filed by heirs who themselves survived the Holocaust. Since 2014, Israel and Germany have been working together on provenance-related cases.

Restitution Committees

The five restitution commissions in Europe joined forces on January 1, 2019, with the creation of the Network of European Restitution Committees on Nazi-Looted Art. The Advisory Commission on the return of cultural property seized as a result of Nazi persecution, especially Jewish property (Germany), Commission for the Compensation of Victims of Spoliation (France), Spoliation Advisory Panel (Great Britain), Commission for Provenance Research (Austria) and the Dutch Restitution Committee have entered into an alliance in order to achieve closer cooperation and knowledge sharing. For example, the network regularly publishes a joint newsletter with contributions on various restitutions.

A recent development is that Switzerland is also appointing a special commission to adjudicate looted art, as was announced on 22 November 2023. Similar to the restitution commissions just appointed, the Independent Commission for Historically Contaminated Cultural Heritage will issue only non-binding opinions. These will include claims by victims of the Holocaust or their relatives, as well as art that came into the country through colonialism. This is an important difference from the restitution commissions just described, which deal only with cases involving Nazi looted art. For a long time, colonial looted art received less attention than Nazi looted art, but this has been shifting since the 1990s. There may also be a role for restitution commissions in the future regarding colonial looted art.

On 24 October 2023, the Dutch Restitutions Committee advised the municipality of Rotterdam to return the ivory relief Hodegetria or Mary with Child to the heirs of the partners of Kunsthaus A.S. Drey. The relief had been purchased by the municipality in 1958 from the estate of D.G. van Beuningen for placement in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen. In the light of research by the Expertise Center for Restitution (ECR), it was considered highly plausible that this work of art came from the collection of art dealership A.S. Drey in Munich. This art dealership was owned by the German-Jewish Drey family until 1936. They managed to get out of Germany in 1936 and 1939. Moreover, it was found believable that the relief had been sold involuntarily, due to circumstances directly related to the Nazi regime. This resulted in financial difficulties, forcing the family to dispose of the relief. Attempts to recover the relief took shape as early as 1948. The city of Rotterdam agreed with the binding opinion and will return the artwork to the heirs of the partners of Kunsthaus A.S. Drey.

Fritz Grünbaum

A more successful story is that of the family of Fritz Grünbaum, a Jewish cabaret performer who was murdered in the Dachau concentration camp during World War II. Through a variety of lawsuits, the family members have also tried to recover seven works by Austrian artist Egon Schiele. Late last year, these works of art were returned. It is estimated that the value of the paintings is between $780,000 and $2.75 million. In total, Grünbaum had 81 works of art by this artist. After his arrest, Grünbaum’s wife was pressured by the Nazis to hand over the collection. The art was subsequently sold by the Nazis and then traded for years afterward. The court ruled that the pieces had never been voluntarily sold or given away, making his descendants the rightful owners. When it turned out that the seven works had been sold by a dealer in Manhattan, the prosecution was able to make a case out of it. The private collectors and famous museums voluntarily gave up the pieces once they learned from the prosecution that they were stolen art.

Auctions or by accident

It is more common for looted art to turn up in auctions and thus find its way back to its rightful owners. Last year, for example, the 16th-century canvas Madonna and Child by Alessandro Turchi was discovered at an auction in Tokyo by employees of the Polish Ministry of Culture. The precious painting was listed among the 521 most valuable works of art looted in Poland under the Nazi regime. The original owner was a member of the Polish noble family Lubomirski. The return was long negotiated but eventually an auction house and the last owner handed the painting over to Poland at no cost.

Art treasures are also sometimes recovered by accident. Such was the case during a search for possible tax evasion in Munich in 2012. During the search of an apartment there, a collection of fifteen hundred art pieces was found, hundreds of which fall under the heading of looted art. Some of the works were also registered internationally as missing and part of the art had once been part of the previously mentioned traveling exhibition. The flat belonged to Cornelius Gurlitt, the son of Hildebrand Gurlitt. He was an art collector during World War II who also worked on behalf of the Germans. The collection found included art treasures by Picasso, Matisse and Liebermann, among others. The discovery was kept quiet for nearly two years so that an art historian could have a chance to inventorize the collection. Eventually the news did leak out, leading to a real sensation. Various paintings from the collection have since been returned to their original owners or put up for auction.

Jewish community

In the above cases, it was the heirs who actively pursued restitution. What is the right thing to do when there are no rightful owners and/or heirs? This ties in with one of the broader issues that arises in the debate about the restitution of looted art, namely to whom  restitution should be made. The Washington Principles speak of a “restitution policy based on reasonableness and fairness”. In the Netherlands in 2021, the decision was made to return such works to the Jewish community. Another example of how this can be handled is that such cultural objects are displayed in museums, but under the statement that it was looted by the Germans during the war or forcibly sold. This, after all, also makes it clear that the museum or the State is not the rightful owner. 

Conclusion

This article covered several developments regarding Nazi looting. It showed that both good steps are being taken and that there is room for improvement. The implementation of the Washington Principles is still pending in quite a few countries. Possibly the increasing discussion regarding colonial looted art will revive this debate as well. The fact that property owners must therefore invoke civil procedures does not always benefit the restitution process. Fortunately, there are also success stories, as in the case of Madonna and Child and Hodegetria or Mary and Child.

Julia is studying Liberal Arts and Sciences at Utrecht University, majoring in International Relations in Historical Perspective. She has also completed a bachelor’s degree in Notarial Law.

Images: Shutterstock