Art Litigation: American Association of Museums Should Be Prosecuted For Concealing Stolen Property

MoMA's Glenn Lowry - Asserting Statutes of Limitations Against Heirs of Nazi Persecutees and Getting Richly Compensated For It

On Friday, I attended a panel on the U.S. State Department's proposal to set up a U.S. Commission to deal with the problem of Nazi-looted art in U.S. museum collections.   More on the panel, Wrestling the Dead Hand of History organized by Prof. Jennifer Kreder here.

Amb. Stuart Eizenstat - Expressing Outrage

The atmosphere was one of unanimous outrage over the misbehavior of U.S. museums and their lack of adherence to the Washington Principles on Nazi-Confiscated Art.  U.S. museums have taken to suing heirs of victims of Nazi persecution to avoid discovery and litigation "on the merits".   U.S. museums assert laches and statute of limitations defenses, knowing that it will damage international efforts to obtain recoveries of artworks from museum collections around the world.  If the U.S. is not going to support Jewish heirs, then who will?

The Jewish Claims Conference and Ronald Lauder's Commission for Art Recovery have asked U.S. museums to renounce the use of "technical" legal defenses such as laches and statutes of limitations as being unethical.   According to Lauder's lawyer Charles Goldstein, who signed the letter, the AAM and AAMD have not even bothered to respond to the request.   This is not the usual museum practice in dealing with a billionaire's lawyer.

In the postwar era, U.S. museums acquired tens of thousands of potentially-looted artworks. They've given virtually none of it back, have not properly researched their collections, and sit back hoping that the heirs of an exterminated population will never figure it out.   According to the museums, it is the job of the people who were murdered to finance and assert claims, after which, museums will decide whether or not to give the work back.

Museums claim that no one had any idea about the Holocaust when they acquired these artworks from the 1940's until today, often as donations, almost always without paperwork.   Since the severe Nazi persecution of Jews and the spoliation of their property was on the front page of every newspaper in the world starting in March 1933, the museums are engaging in a particularly pernicious form of Holocaust denial.

The custom and practice in the art world has always been to get documentation of the artwork's prior ownership and authenticity.  If you didn't get the paperwork, you were taking a risk that the property was stolen.   This practice has not changed, yet museums falsely claim that this is a recent development.  Wealthy Americans who bought European art at bargain prices without paperwork in the '40's, '50's and 60's knew darned well that they were probably buying stolen art.  Museum people always knew of the problem and were specifically and repeatedly warned in writing by the U.S. State Department in the 1940's and 1950's against acquiring artworks lacking paperwork.  Receiving stolen property has alway been a crime.


18 U.S.C. § 662 : US Code - Section 662: Receiving stolen property within special maritime and territorial jurisdiction

Whoever, within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States, buys, receives, or conceals any money, goods, bank notes, or other thing which may be the subject of larceny, which has been feloniously taken, stolen, or embezzled, from any other person, knowing the same to have been so taken, stolen, or embezzled, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; but if the amount or value of thing so taken, stolen or embezzled does not exceed $1,000, he shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.

(Italics supplied).

U.S. museums that refuse to disclose the documents necessary to trace the true owners of artworks in their collections should be prosecuted and their directors jailed.

Alfred Flechtheim - U.S. Museums Will Not Reveal Provenance Documents Relating To His 1933 Inventory

Image Jacob Hilsdorf 1910 courtesy Wikipedia

U.S. museums have it backwards and should be trying to figure out whose stolen property they are holding.  It was heartwarming to hear Goldstein affirm that museums do not have a fiduciary duty to litigate all claims and defenses relating to the stolen art in their collections.

When will the AAM and AAMD respond?   And without Robert Morgenthau on the scene, who will keep the museums honest?

International Law: Wrestling the Dead Hand of History - Panel on Nazi Looted Art

Alfred Flechtheim portrait 1910 by Jacob Hilsdorf

Courtesy Wikipedia

Professor Jen Kreder announced on the Intlawgrrls blog her panel this coming Friday March 26 in Washington DC at the American Society of International Law.

The panel, called "Wrestling the Dead Hand of History: Perspectives on a Proposed State Department Commission on Nazi Looted Art," and features Jen Kreder with Ambassadors Kennedy and Eizenstat, Dr. Lucille A. Roussin (left) of Cardozo School of Law, and New York-based attorney Charles A. Goldstein.

I support the US State Department's proposal to set up a U.S. Commission to return artworks in US museums that were stolen from Jews and never returned.

If the US doesn't take this measure and force our museums to start telling the truth about where the art in their collections come from, we can hardly expect other countries such as Russia, Poland and Austria to return all of the arts stolen from Jews by the Nazis.

I will be attending the panel. Jen is launching a special interest group of the American Society of International Law  on the International Law of Cultural Heritage & the Arts.

Above at top is a photograph of Alfred Flechtheim, the leading contemporary art dealer in the Weimar Republic and reviled in Nazi propaganda as the "Artjew Flechtheim".   You will find practically nothing written about Flechtheim in the English language - the U.S. museums who have the artworks stolen from his Berlin and Dusseldorf galleries would like to write Flechtheim out of history.  Below, Flechtheim's portrait by Otto Dix.  Dix's style shown below was known as "Neue Sachtlicheit" (New Objectivity).

Alfred Flechtheim the Art Dealer - Otto Dix 1926

US State Dept Announces January 7, 2010 Town Hall on Creating US Commission on Restituting Artworks Stolen During the Holocaust

In today's Federal Register, we find the announcement that the US State Department is following up on this summer's Terezin Declaration by exploring the possibility of creating a commission in the US to work on restituting artworks stolen by the Nazis during the Holocaust.   Amb. Stuart Eizenstat has been at the forefront of this discussion. 

In 2006,  AAMD President James Cuno testified before Congress that there were "tens of thousands" of potentially problematic artworks in US museums.

Last night's airing of the film The Rape of Europa on PBS sparked a number of emails from friends who care about this issue.

US museums have shamefully abandoned their commitments to fully research their collections, to make provenance information public and transparent, and to restitute stolen artworks to the rightful owners.

[Federal Register: December 8, 2009 (Volume 74, Number 234)]


[Notices]

[Page 64803-64804]

From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

[DOCID:fr08de09-121]



=======================================================================

-----------------------------------------------------------------------



DEPARTMENT OF STATE



[Public Notice 6832]





Town Hall Meeting To Consider the Establishment of a U.S.

Commission on Cultural Materials Displaced During World War II, and the

Implementation of the Art Restitution Provisions of the June 30, 2009

Terezin Declaration



The Department of State's Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues is

calling a Town Hall Meeting January 7, 2010 from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at

the Department to get the views of interested individuals and

organizations on the establishment of a U.S. commission on cultural

materials displaced during World War II. The meeting will also discuss

the June 30, 2009 Terezin Declaration, the text of which is at http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leavingFR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/or/126162.htm.

Individuals wishing to attend this Town Hall Meeting should

register no later than January 5, 2010 by emailing the following

information to Ms. Carolyn Jones-Johnson (Jones-JohnsonCD@state.gov):



Full Name

Date of Birth

Number of Government-issued Picture ID (Driver's License Number,

including State of Issuance, U.S. Passport or Alternate Government-

Issued Picture ID)

Organization which you represent, and its Address and Phone Number

Home Address (only if attending as an individual)



Those who register are urged to arrive at the Department by 12:45

p.m. to allow time for security screening. Upon arrival, show a valid

government-issued identification (a U.S. state driver's license or a

U.S. passport.) The official address of the State Department is 2201 C

Street, NW., Washington, DC. Attendees should use the ``23rd Street

Entrance'' on the West Side of the State Department's Harry S. Truman

Building, located on 23rd Street between C Street and D Street, NW.,

Washington, DC.

Written comments on the above subjects may also be provided to the

same e-mail address for Ms. Jones-Johnson cited above.





[[Page 64804]]





Dated: December 2, 2009.

Ambassador J. Christian Kennedy,

Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues, Department of State.

[FR Doc. E9-29226 Filed 12-7-09; 8:45 am]

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.

Nazi Looted Art in U.S. Museums: Amb. Stuart Eizenstat's Call for a US Commission

Ambassador Stuart E. Eizenstat was appointed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to lead a delegation to the Prague Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets. Eizenstat was the principle architect of the 1999 Washington Conference on the same topic. He authored the book Imperfect Justice and has been instrumental in achieving international solutions that afford restitution to Holocaust victims.

In the PBS video linked to below, Eizenstat calls for the U.S. to create a commission of experts to rule on ownership issues and decries U.S. museums that are asserting "technical defenses" such as statutes of limitations against Holocaust victims and their heirs.
Check out http://www.pbs.org/newshour/art/blog/2009/07/conversation-stuart-eizenstat.html

For the full text of what came out of the Prague Conference, known as the Terezin Declaration, click here.

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.