Returning Stolen Artwork

Posted by Mary Rayme Jul 27, 2006

Yup, World War II was officially over in 1945. But artworks stolen from their Jewish owners by the Nazis are still being returned to their original owners.

And there's a website that can help you find artwork that changed hands in Europe from 1933-1945. The Nazi-Era Provenance Internet Portal has a database of artwork that is produced and managed by the American Association of Museums.

It's kind of a quiet story that will never make the prime-time news, but artwork from all over the world is being re-evaluated and its provenance challenged. There are numerous cases of families being reunited with paintings that had been bought by museums; such as when a Van Gogh was returned to an 85-year old woman named Gerta Silverberg whose family originally owned the painting.

There are also many looted works still in what used to be east Germany and in Russia. The Jewish Claims Conference in Frankfurt seems to offer a European counterpart to the American Association of Museums site.

I like the idea of returning the so-called spoils of war to their rightful owners. The process sounds difficult and laborious. It says that as humans, we try to get it right even if we have done wrong.