Art Litigation: Jewish Property Declarations: The Law of April 26, 1938

Today is the anniversary of the April 26, 1938 decree by Goering requiring Jews to declare their property.  It is important that any student of the Holocaust read the text of the decree, reproduced in italics below.  There is very little written about this law, which was a critical turning point in the Nazis' adoption of the Final Solution.  First robbery, then murder of the despoiled victims.

Today, the consequences of this law are still being litigated in the United States.  US museums are successfully clinging to artworks stolen pursuant to the April 26, 1938 decree and the subsequent measures.  The Jewish Property Declarations were sealed by Austria from 1945 until 1993.   Now US museums are suing Jewish descendants of Holocaust victims to "quiet title" to the artworks in their collections, in violation of international law and the United States' commitment to return Nazi spoils  to their victims.

DOCUMENT 1406-PS
1938 REICHSGESETZBLATT, PART I, PAGE 414
~ Decree for the Reporting of Jewish Owned Property of 26 April
1938
On the basis of the Decree for the Execution of the Four Year Plan of 18 October 1936 (RGBl I, 887) the following is hereby decreed:
Article 1
1. Every Jew (Article 5 of the First Regulation under the Reich Citizenship Law of 14 November 1935 (RGBI I, 1338)) shall report and evaluate in accordance with the following instructions his entire domestic and foreign property and estate on the day when this decree goes into force. Jews of foreign citizenship shall report and evaluate only their domestic property
2. The duty to report holds likewise for the non-Jewish marital partner of a Jew.
3. Every reporting person's property must be given separately.
Article 2
1. Property in the sense of this law includes the total property of the person required to report, irrespective of whether it is exempt from any form of taxation or not.
2. It does not include movable objects used by the individual or house furnishings as far as the latter are not luxury objects.
Article 3
1. Every part of the property shall be valued according to the usual valuation it has on the effective date of this regulation.
2. No report is necessary when the total worth of the property to be reported does not exceed 5000 marks.
Article 4
The report is to be presented on an official form by 20 June 1938, to the administrative official responsible at the place of residence of the reporting individual. When such a report is not possible by this date the responsible official can extend the period. In such case, however, an estimate is to be presented by 30 June 1938, together with a statement of the grounds of delay.
Article 5
1. The reporting individual must report, after this decree goes into force, to the responsible office, every change of said individual's total property as far as it exceeds a proper standard of living or normal business transactions.
2. The reporting requirement applies also to those .Jews who were not required to report on the effective date of this regulation but who have acquired property exceeding 5000 Reichsmarks in value, after this date. Article 1 (1) clause 2, shall apply respectively.
Article 6
1. The administrative offices responsible under this reguhttlon are in Prussia-Highest Administrative Officer [Reierungspraesident] (in Berlin the Police President) ; Bavalria Administrative Officer [Regierungspraesident] ; Saxony---Tivoli District Head [Kreishauptmann]; Wurtemberg-The Minister of the Interior; Baden-The Minister of the Interior; ThueringenReich Governor [Reichsstatthalter]; Hessen-Reich Governor; Hamburg-Reich Governor; Mecklenburg-Ministry of the State, Interior Department; Oldenburg-Minister of Interi01•; Braunschweig- Ministry of Interior; Bremen-Senator for Administration of Interior; Anhalt-Ministry of State Interior Department; Lippe-Reich Governor (Land Government); SchaumburgLippe-Land Government; Saarland-The Reich Commissioner for the Saar.
2. Austria-The Reich Governor has jurisdiction. He may transfer his authority to another board.
Article 7
The Deputy for the Four Year Plan is empowered to take such necessary measures as may be necessary to guarantee the use of the reported property in accord with the necessities of German economy.
Article 8
1. Whoever wilfully or negligently fails to comply with this reporting requirement, either by omitting it, or making it incorrectly, or not within the time specified, or whoever acts contrary to any instruction issued pursuant to Article 7 by the Deputy of the Four Year Plan shall be punishable by imprisonment and by a fine or by both of these penalties, in particularly flagrant cases of wilful violation the offender may be condemned to hard labor up to ten years. The offender is punishable notwithstanding that the action was in a foreign country.
2. Any attempt to commit such actions is punishable.
3. In addition to the imposition of the penalties under (1), the property may be confiscated, insofar as it was involved in the criminal action. In addition to hard labor confiscation may be made. Where no specific individual can be prosecuted or convicted, confiscation may be decreed independently, where the prerequisites for confiscation warrant it.
Berlin, 26 April 1938
The Deputy for the Four Year Plan
Goering
General Field Marshal
The Reich Minister of the Interior
Frick

Adolph Eichmann set up the Zentralstelle in Vienna in August 1938.  He described it as a "conveyor belt".  You put a Jew and his property on one end and the Jew emerged with a passport and no property on the other end.  Eichmann is considered the "father" of spoliation for profit and the creation of the "Vienna model" of despoiling Jews before exporting them or murdering them.   The problem arose that no country wanted to accept Jews that had been completely spoliated.  Murder thus became the next logical step.

Nazi Era Laws - Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression - Translated


More information on Bakalar v Vavra, a recent Second Circuit case interpreting the April 26, 1938 Jewish Property declaration decree here.

More on Austria's violations of the Austrian State Treaty here.

A report on how the Museum of Modern Art in New York is the largest repository in the nation of Nazi looted art coming in through Switzerland here.


 http://www.dunnington.com/rdowd_bio.html

 Purchase Copyright Litigation Handbook 2010 by Raymond J. Dowd from West here  

Fair Use Friday: Holocaust Survivor Dances To "I Will Survive" At Auschwitz Death Camp

An extraordinary video, Auschwitz survivor dances with his grandchildren at Auschwitz to Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive".

News "Dancing Auschwitz" artist unbowed by criticism



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June 15 Cocktails and Dinner - Murder, Mystery and Egon Schiele's Dead City Dinner at the Harmonie Club NYC

 Egon Schiele's Dead City - Stolen from Fritz Grunbaum

Murder, Mystery and Egon Schiele's Dead City

Cocktails: 6:30 Dinner and Speaker to Follow

When:  Tuesday June 15, 2010

Where:  Harmonie Club

4 East 60th Street (212) 355-7400

Cost:  $150

NYS Medical Defense Bar Association $125

Payment:  Check to "New York State Medical Defense Bar Association"

RSVP  Andrew M. Neubardt

Rende, Ryan & Downes LLP

(914)  681-0444

aneubardt@rrd-law.com

In 1998 D.A. Robert Morgenthau created worldwide headlines when he entered the Museum of Modern Art and seized two stolen artworks, Egon Schiele's Portrait of Wally and Egon Schiele's Dead City. After more than a decade, litigation surrounding both artworks is still raging, with Dead City at the center of an appeal to the first Holocaust-era art trial ever in a U.S. federal court. Ray Dowd of Dunnington Bartholow & Miller LLP represents the heirs of Fritz Grunbaum, the Jewish cabaret performer and owner of Dead City when he died in the Dachau Concentration Camp. He will take us on a visually-compelling tour of Nazi art looting and discuss its implications for U.S. museums today.

Praise for Murder, Mystery and Egon Schiele's Dead City

The program was outstanding and participants offered many positive comments on their evaluations, including the following: “Better than excellent; Hauntingly brilliant in every way! Extraordinary research and amazing cadence in relating it; Subtly spellbinding, no speaker more thorough!; Nice guy; Wonderful!; Fascinating; Very knowledgeable—impressive; Very interesting; Very well done, detailed explanation of subject.”


Mindy Blechman, Continuing Legal Education Director, Gratz College

The thoroughness with which you presented the diabolically methodical process that the Third Reich used to despoil Jews of their property kept the class riveted during your lecture. The horror of the Nazi art looting came to life for the audience as you presented the evidentiary issues and the legal problems associated with restitution litigation for holocaust victims and families. Since your presentation, many of the attendees have contacted me and commented on how astonished they were after your lecture. It is chilling to realize how methodical and relentless the Third Reich was in their pillaging operations.

Filippa Marullo Anzalone
Assoc. Dean, Boston College Law School

Ray's presentation was dynamic and deeply moving. He is an entertaining speaker, and supremely knowledgeable about Holocaust art recovery and the legal and ethical issues associated with this complex topic. He presented before a Bar Association audience of judges and lawyers in Cincinnati, and gave a second presentation at the Cincinnati Museum Center. His talk was compelling and very well received.

Michael Newman
Federal Bar Association, Vice President for the Sixth Circuit


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Nazi Looted Art Panel: Dutch Have "Moral Obligation" To Steal 2/3 of Christian Painting from Jews

Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry, Folio 147r - The Road to Calvary the Musée Condé, Chantilly (courtesy Wikipedia - not the painting in dispute)

The Dutch celebrated Memorial Day by making sure that the dirty work done by the Nazis of stealing from Jews was profitable for Dutch citizens - basically spitting on the graves of those soldiers who fought against Nazism.

Rather than make restitution of an artwork stolen from the Oppenheimer family, the Dutch have decided that the people who got it through a Nazi forced auction should pocket 2/3 of the proceeds.   This is disgusting and should be condemned.

The press release below:

PRESS RELEASE


The Hague, 31 May 2010

BINDING ADVICE ON DISPUTE OVER THE PAINTING ROAD TO CALVARY

THE HAGUE – The Restitutions Committee has issued binding advice concerning the dispute over the division of proceeds from the sale of a privately owned painting, Road to Calvary, Brunswijker Monogrammist (16th century).

The painting Road to Calvary was taken from the possession of the Jewish Oppenheimer family 75 years ago at an enforced auction in Nazi Germany. The current owner is a Dutch private individual who wants to sell the artwork. The parties were divided over how much of the sale proceeds would come to the Oppenheimer family. In its binding recommendation, the Restitutions Committee has now concluded that in the event of a sale, the current owner should relinquish one third of the net proceeds to the Oppenheimer family.

The Committee was able to establish that husband and wife Jakob and Rosa Oppenheimer involuntarily lost possession of the painting during the Nazi regime, at what was known as a Judenauktion (Jewish auction) at an auction house in Berlin in 1935. The current applicants on the part of the Oppenheimer family are all grandchildren of Jakob and Rosa Oppenheimer. The family discovered the location of Road to Calvary in 2006 after a report by Sotheby’s auction house in Amsterdam, where it had been taken to be valued.

The current owner came into possession of the painting as a result of inheritance from her father, who died in 1999. Her father probably bought the painting at a jumble sale or fair in the province of Noord-Holland in the period between 1985 and 1995 for the approximate sum of one hundred guilders. The art work has recently been valued at €80,000. The current owner wants to sell the painting Road to Calvary, but the parties could not agree on the division of any sale proceeds, which is why they requested that the Restitutions Committee issue a binding recommendation. The Committee concluded that in the special circumstances of this case, according to the standards of reasonableness and fairness, the current owner’s share should be twice that of the Oppenheimer family. According to this recommendation, in the event of a sale, a one third share of the net proceeds should be relinquished to the Oppenheimer family. This conclusion reflects that the current owner’s right of ownership is beyond all doubt and, all Press release on Restitutions Committee binding advice RC 3.95 2 in all, carries the most weight in this case. At the same time, the ownership of Road to Calvary as a looted work of art has brought forth a moral obligation towards the Oppenheimer family.

The Restitutions Committee

Since January 2002, the Restitutions Committee has provided recommendations to the

Minister for Education, Culture and Science regarding claims to items of cultural value in

the possession of the national government. In addition, the Committee can also issue

binding recommendations concerning disputes between two parties over an item of

cultural value not in the possession of the national government. Such advice is given on

the basis of what is ‘reasonable and fair’. Use the following link to access the complete

version of the recommendation in this case (RC 3.95), which can be found on the

Committee’s website:

http://www.restitutiecommissie.nl/en/rc_3.95/bindend_advies_rc_3.95.html.

More information:

For more information, please contact Evelien Campfens, secretary/rapporteur of the

Restitutions Committee on +31(0)70 376 59 92.

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Invitation: February 11 Lecture at Cincinnati Museum Center on Recovery of Nazi Looted Art

Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal

invites you to an evening with

Raymond J. Dowd, Esquire
Partner, Dunnington, Bartholow & Miller LLP
Thursday, February 11, 2010
6 p.m.

Heavy appetizers and cash bar

7:30 p.m.

Insights Lecture Series

Murder, Mystery, and The Dead City

Mr. Dowd will speak about the battles to recover art stolen from Jewish Holocaust victims, the undisclosed role of the Swiss in laundering looted art for the Nazis, and the implications for U.S. museums holding artworks of European origin.

$25 per person for reception includes parking.

Lecture open to the public. Parking $4.

Reception reservations requested to Sarah McManus

by Monday, February 8, 2010

(513) 287-7074 or smcmanus@cincymuseum.org
In partnership with

Co-sponsored by Northern Kentucky University Chase College of Law and

the Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky Chapter of the Federal Bar Association.

Christie's Off The Hook For Selling Nazi Looted Art To Innocent Purchaser

In Doss, Inc. v. Yoon Young Im, a case decided by Chief Judge Loretta Preska of the Southern District of New York on September 23, 2009, Christie's successfully fended off a claim from a purchaser who'd bought what turned out to be Nazi looted art for $235,000 at a 1991 auction in New York.

The case arose when in 2008, Doss, Inc., the purchaser of a Marie Laurencin Portrait from Christie's tried to sell it through Sotheby's. Sotheby's researched the artwork and found that it had been looted by the Nazis from the well-known Paris art dealer Paul Rosenberg. Sotheby's informed Doss Inc. (the would-be seller) that the artwork was stolen.

Doss then sued Christie's for breach of warranty. The problem is that New York's U.C.C. Section 275 provides a four-year statute of limitations for breach of warranty (claim for breach of warranty must be commenced within four years of tender of delivery of the goods).

Once the four years runs, a seller of stolen goods is off the hook in New York, as far as New York's U.C.C. is concerned, unless some tolling principle, such as fraudulent concealment. New York is a buyer beware state. But it would certainly be surprising if Christie's didn't know what it was selling when it put the work up for auction in 1991.

Auction houses and museum have been peddling the fiction that Hitler's art looting was not "discovered" until the mid-1990's. But the Nurember trials covered these crimes on the front pages of the New York Times and such authors as Janet Flanner covered Nazi art looting activities in depth in an extraordinary three-part series in the New Yorker magazine in 1947. Museums and auction houses would prefer to forget about such works as David Roxan & Ken Wanstall's groundbreaking report based on the Art Looting Intelligence Unit's Reports - The Rape of Art: The Story of Hitler's Plunder of the Great Masterpieces of Europe (Cowan-Mc Gill New York 1964). Flanner's accounts of artworks being uncovered in salt mines together with gold teeth removed from Jewish corpses is a chilling reminder of how the Nazis intertwined looting and murder.

The truth is, museums, private owners and auction houses have been waiting for a couple of generations of Jews to die so that they can safely peddle and display the looted artworks held in their collections.

Christie's didn't know it was stolen in 1991 when they sold it? Horsefeathers!

Murder Mystery and Egon Schiele's Dead City: Nazi Looted Artworks in US Museums

In May of this year I gave a lecture at the Jewish Museum titled "Murder, Mystery and Egon Schiele's Dead City: Swiss Laundering of Stolen Austrian Artwork". You can access a video of the lecture here at a blog called Art Stolen from Fritz Grunbaum.

I took the photo at left in the Holocaust Tower at the Jewish Museum.

If you care about the issue of artworks looted by the Nazis being concealed by the Austrians and the Swiss - and never returned to the heirs of their murdered Jewish owners, then you will find the video of interest.

According to 2006 Congressional testimony of AAMD President James Cuno, U.S. museums contain tens of thousands of artworks that were potentially looted by the Nazis that U.S. museums have failed to research. Since many families were wiped out entirely, there are no heirs to claim stolen Jewish assets in U.S. museums.

According to a recent statement by Amb. Stuart Eizenstat, 1% of Holocaust survivors die each month. 36% of them live at or below the poverty line.

U.S. museums promised to make all of their records relating to Holocaust-era assets public in 1999 and to put this information online to aid the Diaspora in tracing their heritage. This was at the Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets.

Unfortunately, U.S. museums have failed to follow up on their promises. Each item in a museum, like, for example, the Museum of Modern Art, has a "confidential object file" The "confidential object file" is concealed from historians as a matter of routine. New York City taxpayers subsidize this concealment by giving tax breaks and grants to institutions like the MoMA.

If you visit the MoMA's website, you can click "Explore" and "Collection" and find "Provenance Research Project". In there, you will find 719 objects fitting the criteria of having entered the U.S. after 1932 but created before 1946. Numerous of these objects were stolen by the Nazis and never returned to their true owners.

Although there was a movement during the Clinton Administration to push U.S. museums to reveal information relating to European artworks entering the U.S. after 1933 but created before 1945, but this initiative was dropped like a hot potato once the Bush/Cheney administration came to power.

Unfortunately, Edgar Bronfman, who was a real leader in this area was replaced by art collector Ronald Lauder who has resisted disclosure of his art dealings.

Visiting the Jewish Museum in Berlin was an incredible experience. The building was designed by architect Daniel Libeskind in a manner designed to disturb and disrupt your expectations.

I have reprinted below the Washington Principles on Nazi-Confiscated Art from the U.S. State Department website.

Other countries have made great strides in remedying this problem. Let's hope that the Obama Administration will make it a priority.

Washington Conference Principles On Nazi-Confiscated Art Released in connection with the Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets, Washington, DC, December 3, 1998

In developing a consensus on non-binding principles to assist in resolving issues relating to Nazi-confiscated art, the Conference recognizes that among participating nations there are differing legal systems and that countries act within the context of their own laws.

I. Art that had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted should be identified.

II. Relevant records and archives should be open and accessible to researchers, in accordance with the guidelines of the International Council on Archives.

III. Resources and personnel should be made available to facilitate the identification of all art that had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted.

IV. In establishing that a work of art had been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted, consideration should be given to unavoidable gaps or ambiguities in the provenance in light of the passage of time and the circumstances of the Holocaust era.

V. Every effort should be made to publicize art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted in order to locate its pre-War owners or their heirs.

VI. Efforts should be made to establish a central registry of such information.

VII. Pre-War owners and their heirs should be encouraged to come forward and make known their claims to art that was confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted.

VIII. If the pre-War owners of art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis and not subsequently restituted, or their heirs, can be identified, steps should be taken expeditiously to achieve a just and fair solution, recognizing this may vary according to the facts and circumstances surrounding a specific case.

IX. If the pre-War owners of art that is found to have been confiscated by the Nazis, or their heirs, can not be identified, steps should be taken expeditiously to achieve a just and fair solution.

X. Commissions or other bodies established to identify art that was confiscated by the Nazis and to assist in addressing ownership issues should have a balanced membership.

XI. Nations are encouraged to develop national processes to implement these principles, particularly as they relate to alternative dispute resolution mechanisms for resolving ownership issues.

German and Other Foreign Heirs in New York: Standing To Sue Clarified in Andrew Lloyd Webber Picasso Case

Schoeps v. Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation, N.Y.L.J. August 14, 2009 courtesy Amlawdaily here. The heirs of Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy suffered a setback in New York's Appellate Division, First Department when the court found that Julius Schoeps, a German heir seeking the return of an artwork taken from Mendelssohn-Bartholdy under duress during Nazi rule in Germany.

Nazis looted tens of thousands of artworks by forcing Jews to "sell" the works and "paying" the money into blocked accounts that would be stolen by the Nazis or forced Jews to pay confiscatory foreign exchange rates of up to 96% if they wanted to flee Nazi Germany. So for example if a Jew wanted $4 in U.S. currency, he would have to pay $100 worth of Reichsmarks to obtain it.

Schoeps, an heir under German law of Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, commenced an action in New York without complying with Section 13-3.5 of New York's Estates Powers and Trusts Law ("EPTL") titled "Action or proceeding by foreign personal or other legal representative.

The problem is that in Germany and certain other countries, there is no such thing as an "estate" in the sense that we know it here. Heirs may become so by operation of law and may not have letters of administration as is the practice in common law jurisdictions. For heirs inheriting in such jurisdictions, the practice is to either obtain letters in New York or obtain an affidavit from a foreign legal expert and the heirs themselves swearing to their legal entitlement in that foreign jurisdiction.

In Schoeps v. The Museum of Modern Art, 594 F. Supp.2d 461 (S.D.N.Y. 2009), Mr. Schoeps got a much better result based on the opinion of a foreign legal expert that Judge Rakoff took into account.

As I outlined in my speech at the Prague Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets in June (view video here), many legal obstacles arise for heirs pursuing artworks looted in the Nazi era. It is tough legal work, not for the faint of heart. And unfortunately, apart from some excellent works published in the past there is very little scholarly historical work in this area (a recent exception is Martin Dean's excellent Robbing the Jews: The Confiscation of Jewish Property in the Holocaust, 1933-1945 (Cambridge 2008). There is almost no legal scholarship in this area (I took the foreign exchange example above from Dean's book).

The world's greatest robbery is hiding behind the world's greatest murder.

Our current court system - in decisions around the country -- seems to consider that six million Jews gave up their belongings "voluntarily" for next to nothing and seems to ignore postwar German and Austrian laws (drafted by the Allies) nullifying such transactions.

Although it appears that Mr. Schoeps did not encounter an insurmountable hurdle (the requirement of an affidavit of a foreign legal expert), in no other context do owners of stolen property find such a hard time getting it back. As I argued in Prague, if someone steals your car, you call the police. When a Jew wants stolen art back, the rules seem to change, and the cops don't have the education or the interest to cope with the problem.

Nazi Looted Art at Oberlin College and Other U.S. Museums: Prague Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets

In late June I was invited to speak on a panel of legal experts on artwork looted by the Nazis. My topic was legal obstacles to the recovery of stolen artworks.

The image you see here is of an artwork by the artist Egon Schiele called Girl with Black Hair. Every major Schiele expert in the world - Jane Kallir, Eberhard Kornfeld and Rudolph Leopold - has said that this artwork came from Fritz Grunbaum's collection. Yet Oberlin College refuses to return it - or even to share their research or conclusions about where they believe it came from. Oberlin's website shows that the work mysteriously surfaced in Switzerland in 1956 - and stops there.

U.S. museums and liberal arts institutions concealing the origins of their artworks is one of the biggest obstacles to researchers being able to restitute artworks to the Jews and other Nazi persecutees from whom they were stolen. As Holocaust victims and their descendants die, U.S. museums simply wait, knowing that they have stolen artworks in their collections. In his 2006 testimony to Congress, AAMD Director James Cuno estimated the number of potentially Nazi-looted works in U.S. museums at "tens of thousands".
It is astonishing that U.S. museums can engage in this Holocaust denial and feel no backlash. Shame on Oberlin College. Its Dean should be tossed out on his ear.
Amb. Stuart Eizenstat supports a U.S. Art Restitution Commission. Good for him, and not a moment too soon.
You can find my full speech in Prague at the link below.

http://artstolenfromfritzgrunbaum.wordpress.com/category/speech-at-holocaust-conference/live-recorded/
Disclosure: I represent the heirs of Fritz Grunbaum, a Jewish cabaret performer who was murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz.

German Copyright in US Courts

Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin 1971-1995 (Christo & Jeanne-Claude)

I am leaving shortly to go to Germany. I will give a joint lecture at the University of Konstanz's law school with Prof. Dr. Axel Nordemann of Boehmert & Boehmert on July 6. On July 9, I will be giving a lecture in Berlin to the Berlin Chapter of the German Intellectual Property Law Association.(DEUTSCHE VEREINIGUNG FÜR GEWERBLICHEN RECHTSSCHUTZ UND URHEBERRECHT).

In preparation, I have been thinking about what copyrights would be of interest to German students and attorneys. Judge Alex Kozinsky noted in Mattel Inc. v. MCA Records, Inc., 296 F.3d 894 (9th Cir. 2002) that Mattel's Barbie Doll was originally a "German street walker". In that case, the court found that trademark infringement and dilution claims asserted against the Danish band Acqua and their song "Barbie Girl" failed because a trademark owner doesn't have the right to control public discourse when the public imbues a mark beyond its source-identifying function. Barbie has spawned enormous litigation. For example, artist Tom Forsythe was awarded $1.8 milllion in attorneys fees and damages because of Mattel's meritless litigation against him for his "Food Chain Barbie" series of photographs. Mattel Inc. v. Walking Mountain Productions, 353 F.3d 792 (9th Cir. 2003).

One of my favorite German copyright disputes didn't involve a German copyright. The Copyright Office's Board of Appeals rejected Christo and Jean-Claude's application to register their wrapping of the Reichstag in Berlin as a "sculptural work". Re: Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971-1995 Control No. 60-504-9973 Decision of Appeals Board, U.S. Copyright Office, October 1, 1997. The image appears above. Christo and Jean-Claude own the copyright in the photograph shown above, but they do not have a copyright in the sculptural aspects of the wrapped Reichstag. A copy of this decision may be found at Franklin Pierce Law School's IP Mall.

Dr. Nordemann and I will discuss two cases in depth. One, Twin Books Corporation v. The Walt Disney Corporation, 83 F.3d 1162 (9th Cir. 1996), involves the initial publication in Germany in 1923 of the classic children's tale "Bambi, A Life in the Woods" without a US copyright notice.

The second, Blanch v. Koons, 467 F.3d 244 (2d Cir. 2006) involved a fashion photographer named Andrea Blanch visiting the Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin and noticing that a photograph she'd taken had been painted into the latest work of the artist Jeff Koons (Koons and Barbie are jointly responsible for a good chunk of U.S. copyright law). Ms. Blanch returned from Berlin and sued Jeff Koons in New York, rather than in Berlin. Dr. Nordemann and I will discuss whether Germany might not have been a friendlier forum for her, and why.

A Westlaw search of "German copyright law" turned up only five cases in the ALLFEDS database. "German copyright" turned up only ten. "germany w/5 copyright" yielded 18 results, including the famous Wheaton v. Peters, 33 U.S. 591 (1834)("In Germany, where a free, perpetual copyright exists, books are cheaper than any where else in the world.")

But I think that we are going to see many more German copyrights exploited in the United States. I recently had the pleasure of watching Fritz Lang's "M" (1931) - a Criterion collection release. An amazing film.

And two years ago, I started representing the heirs of Fritz Grunbaum. Grunbaum was a Jewish cabaret performer and film star in Berlin who mocked Hitler mercilessly. He was one of the founders and stars of Vienna's Kabarett Simpl. Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Stories" are said to be based on Fritz Grunbaum and his world, which in turn formed the basis for Kander & Ebb's "Cabaret". Grunbaum and many member of his family were murdered by the Nazis. His art collection, like the collections of so many victims of the Holocaust, ended up with a Nazi-owned Austrian transport and storage company called Schenker & Co AG that has never accounted for it. What happened to the artworks after they left Schenker and made their way to the walls of the world's museums is now a hotly disputed matter. According to Eberhard Kornfeld, owner of Galerie Kornfeld in Bern, Switzerland, the Egon Schiele self-portrait hanging in the Morgan Library belonged to Fritz Grunbaum. The Morgan Library's catalog From Berlin to Broadway: The Ebb Bequest of Modern German and Austrian Drawings claims that Kornfeld acquired it from Egon Schiele's estate.

Two years ago, when I googled Fritz Grunbaum I found very little on him. I did it again recently and found blog posts, a museum in Vienna devoted to him, a very respectable Wikipedia entry, and an IMDB filmography of his works. Checking out his film "The Theft of the Mona Lisa" (Der Raub der Mona Lisa) (1931), I discovered that he played the role "Adolph G" to make fun of Hitler and that the New York Times gave the film an amazing review in 1932, which I got to read.

Although Grunbaum's artworks vanished, his copyrighted celluloid image survived, his musical copyrights endured, and the German collecting societies steadily credited his estate with royalties over the years for his famous musical compositions.

Hollywood is hungry for remakes, and the appetite is only growing. Someone is going to want to remake the "Theft of the Mona Lisa" which was based on an actual incident in 1911.

As German films of the twentieth century become better known, catalogued, distributed and affordable, the market for and interest in German copyrights in the United States should grow.