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Country Reports |
Two important events related to the consequences of the Second World War occurred this year in Belgium. Firstly, the government decided to set up a commission to study the fate of the values owned by the Belgian Jewish community and secondly, a painting claimed by Belgium since 1944 has been located.
Given the international context (the existence of similar commissions in other countries such as France, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Hungary and Poland and the revelations about the gold kept by the Swiss banks), the Belgian government decided in June to establish a commission to investigate what has happened to the values belonging to members of the Jewish community of Belgium who were deported during the German occupation. The commission, which is part of the Prime Minister's services, is presided by Baron Jean Godeaux, former chairman of the Belgian National Bank. The members of the commission are representatives of the different ministries involved (namely Economic Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Justice and Public Health), historians and representatives of Jewish organisations. The first meeting of the commission has taken place in July and the start of the work is scheduled for early September. The commission will investigate various subjects, including the bank sector, insurance, real estate and cultural property.
Almost at the same time, the Belgian Restitution Service was able to locate a painting claimed by Belgium since the end of the war. The painting "The Man of Sorrows" is an oak panel painted in the 15th century by an unknown Flemish master and is currently in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (USA). It used to be part of the most important private Belgian collection of Flemish primitives, the Renders collection, which was illegally sold to Herman Göring in 1941. This case, as well as another one involving the Metropolitan Museum, was well covered in the "Boston Globe". Thanks to the catalogues ("Missing Art Works of Belgium I & II") published and widely distributed by our services, Walter Robinson, journalist of the Boston Globe, could locate the painting. The Belgian state now intends to make a claim in order to recuperate the painting as soon as possible.
The following is the text of the final document of the International Scientific Conference on Restitution of Cultural Values: the Problems of Return and Joint Use (Legal, Scientific and Moral Aspects) in Minsk on June 19-20, 1997. For a report on this conference by Alexander Fedoruk see section special reports.
We, scientists, statesmen and public figures of the seven European countries (Byelorussia, Germany, Great Britain, Poland, Russia, Ukraine and the Czech Republic), which assembled for the International Scientific Conference on the Return and Joint Use of Cultural Values:
Adam Maldzis, National Scientific Education Centre F. Skarina, Minsk
The question of the 2,000 works of art, named "MNR" ("Musées nationaux
récup/eacute;ration"), which were entrusted in 1949 to the care of the French museums, has been at the end of the activities of the "Commission de
récupération artistique" (Commission of Artistic Recuperation) of foremost topicality during the last months (cf.
"Spoils of War", no 2, pp. 24-24). Accused of not having made these artworks sufficiently public for 50 years and of not having searched for their eventual owners, suspected of having received ´stolen goods´, the "Direction de musées de France" (Directorate of the Museums of France, DMF) has engaged, since autumn 1996, in a vast information campaign which is not yet completely finished.
This campaign has begun with the organization of the colloquium "Spoils of War and Restitutions. The Destiny of French Works of Art During the Second World War" ("Pillages et restitutions. Le destin des oeuvres d´art sorties de France pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale"), held in Paris, November 17, 1996, under the chairmanship of
Françoise Cachin, Director of the Museums of France. Four important topics were on the agenda, explored by 15 French and foreign speakers: the protection of the national heritage (public and private) during the war; the Nazi plunder, the artmarket under the occupation, the restitutions carried out since the liberation. The publication of the speeches held, co-edited by the DMF and the Parisian editor Adam Biro, will be printed soon. Four days before the colloquium, on November 13, 1996, a catalogue of the MNR had been entered in internet
(http://www.culture.fr under the heading "Documentation"). It lists the MNR deposited in the national museums, the museums of the province and the Mobilier national (national collection of royal furniture): around 2,000 identification descriptions accompanied by photographs, meant to enable potential owners to recognize their properties. Access to internet is in France still the privilege of a minority.
The DMF, preoccupied with reaching the largest possible public, has therefore also asked the main national museums safe-keeping the MNR (The Louvre, Orsay, Versailles,
Sèvres) to organize presentations of these artworks, of which one part is usually stored in depot, mostly due to their mediocre quality or their large quantity. The
"Musée national d´art moderne" (National Museum of Modern Art, MNAM) at the "Centre Georges Pompidou" has taken the same initiative on its behalf. As regards the museums in the province, where almost 700 works of art of the
"Récupération artistique" have been deposited since the 50´s, they are also organizing special presentations at the instigation of the DMF. This undertaking has been carried out from the beginning of April to the beginning of May 1997: initiated by a press conference by the Ministry of Culture, it caused the interest of a numerous public and inspired many articles in the French as well as in the foreign press.
However, it has only resulted in very few restitution demands of the MNR
works 1 which could be taken into consideration by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the DMF. And for good reason: the great majority of MNR, far from having been plundered, were works acquired on the Parisian artmarket, in public sale or in the galleries, by the German collectors and museums, in particular by
Göring and Hitler, and which were recovered by the Allies by virtue of the solemn London Inter-Allied Declaration of 1943 (which annulled commercial transactions with the occupant) or as compensation for the indemnities given to the Reich by the Vichy government for the occupation costs. This came out of the research in the archives of the
"Récupération artistique", kept at the Quai d´Orsay, by a team of curators of the museums of France, consisting of Elisabeth Foucart-Walter, Anne Roquebert and Claude
Lesné. The first results, concerning more than 300 works of art, have been delivered in the extensive press dossier published by the DMF on the occasion of the presentations in April to May, a dossier which contains a detailed outline, both historical and juridical, on the question as well as a complete catalogue of the MNR deposited in the museums of France. This research is also the base of information available on internet, which from November 1996 to May 1997 has registered more than 20,000 searches of
visitors.2 In the end, when the research will be accomplished, an exhaustive MNR catalogue will be published by the
"Réunion des musées nationaux" (Union of the National
Museums).3
Robert Fohr, Head of Communications, Guillaume de La Broise,
No official meetings of joint restitution commissions with other states have taken place since the publication of the last issue of "Spoils of War". On April 16th, 1997 the Polish-German working group met in Berlin for the first time. This working group was established on an expert level in order to exchange information and to clear up problems before the meetings of the official commission. Both parties agreed that the meeting had been very fruitful and had taken place in an atmosphere of mutual understanding. It became apparent that the experts of both countries have similar problems and experiences. The next meeting of the working group is going to take place in autumn this year in Warsaw. The members agreed on tasks to be worked out until the next meeting. Both sides will prepare lists of lost cultural objects and also lists of restitutions between Poland and East/Western Germany since the end of the war. On June 24-25, 1997 a Polish delegation visited the "Koordinierungsstelle". Monika Kuhnke, expert of the Office of the Commissioner for the Polish Cultural Heritage Abroad, and Henryk Kondziela, retired art historian, formerly working at the National Museum of Poznan, studied the documents concerning Polish art losses and were shown the database of the "Koordinierungsstelle". They were accompanied by Ewa Labno-Falecka, cultural attaché at the Polish Embassy in Cologne.
The Russian law was the focus of attention of the media in Germany. As the discussion about the law in Russia is still going on, no official actions were undertaken. During his visit in Germany President Yeltsin and Chancellor Kohl discussed the problem of the cultural losses due to World War II, but no concrete results were achieved. President Yeltsin announced the possibility of the return of the Rathenau archive to Germany. The also mentioned party archive of the SED ("Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands", Socialist United Party of Germany) has nothing to do with World War II losses.
The list of lost objects of the Art Museum of Sewastopol Named after M.P. Kroshitski (Ukraine), was handed over to the German side during the last negotiations. Research is done concerning this list but until now no positive result could be achieved. The Ukrainian-German Commission last met in February 1996.
The Italian Catalogue of Losses "Treasures Untraced - An Inventory of the Italian Art Treasures Lost during the Second World War" was distributed to German institutions to find out if any of the lost art works are in the possession of German museums. The results of this enquiry are not yet complete.
On February 7, 1997 an informal meeting concerning World War II losses took place in Bonn between French and German representatives. The willingness to return museum objects and archival material was discussed as well as the research for special cultural objects. On July 17, 1997 the official meeting of the joint commission took place in Potsdam.
Four drawings were given back by an unknown Ukrainian to the "Kunsthalle Bremen" (Art Gallery Bremen) in February: Christian Morgenstern - "Elblandschaft" (Scenery on the Elbe), Christoph Nathe - "Baumgruppe" (Group of Trees), Adolf Schroedter - "Musikantenschlägerei" (Fight of Musicians), Max Joseph Wagenbauer - "Waldweg mit Brücke" (Forrest Path with Bridge). The drawings were among those taken by the Soviet army.
The portrait "Lady Elizabeth Hervey mit Taube im Arm" (Lady Elizabeth Hervey with Dove in the Arm) was given back to the "Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar" (Art Collections Weimar). It had been offered by Sotheby's in New York and returned after an agreement with the possessor was reached (see Restitutions).
Doris Lemmermeier, Coordination Office of the Federal States
The annual meeting of the Hungarian-Russian Restitution Committee took place on February 24-25, 1997 in Budapest. The committee reviewed the work done in the previous year, during the course of which Hungarian experts identified 126 paintings and sculptures of Hungarian origin which are now housed in the Grabar Institute in Moscow. However, the Russian party only considers the identification of 80 artworks accurate and suggested that further work is necessary for the positive identification of the remaining 54 artworks. Hungarian experts also examined 397 books housed in the Nizhny Novgorod library: 149 originate from the library of the Reformed College in
Sárospatak, and 137 from various other Hungarian collections, while 12 other books still remain to be identified.
The Hungarian party requested the books from the Sárospatak library to be returned as soon as possible to the original owner. The Russian party promised to take the necessary steps concerning this matter. The Russian party gave a brief overview of the law on artworks which was passed by the Russian parliament, according to which the artworks seized during World War II were declared Russian property. The Hungarian party also requested to be granted permission to search for artworks of Hungarian origin in other Russian museums and to be allowed to carry out research in Russian archives. The two parties agreed that the identification of artworks in the above mentioned two collections should be finished by May 31, 1997.
The Russian party briefly reviewed the recently begun work of cataloguing the Russian losses suffered during the war. According to their preliminary findings, together with the German army, the Hungarian army, too, seized various Russian artworks and books in Kursk.
The annual meeting of the Hungarian-Ukrainian Restitution Committee was held on April 3-4, 1997 in
Ungvár (Uzhgorod). This committee also reviewed the work done in the previous year. The Ukrainian party has begun assembling the list of artworks lost during the war; the first part of this list has already been published. Preparations have been made for returning a Hungarian hand-written book in the Kiev library, as well as for the publication of the Ukrainian translation of
Nándor Fettich´s 1943 Kiev diary. (Fettich, a renowned Hungarian archaeologist, was commissioned by the Germans to inspect the museum collections in Kiev. During his stay in Kiev, Fettich did everything in his power to prevent the Germans from taking these collections from Kiev.)
The two parties agreed to continue their research in archives and to exchange photocopies of relevant documents in their respective archives. A Ukrainian informatics expert will study the computer database of the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest sometime during this year. The work of the Hungarian-Ukrainian Restitution Committee is characterized by a spirit of understanding and mutual trust.
István Fodor, Director of the Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum, Budapest
The country report on Italy published in "Spoils of War" no.2, informed the readers about the Italian quest for lost art treasures up to the establishment of the "Commissione Interministeriale per le opere d´arte" in December 1995 and about its first activities. In 1996 the Commissione Interministeriale completed the distribution of the Italian ("L´opera da ritrovare") and English ("Treasures Untraced") versions of our inventory of the Italian art treasures lost during the Second World War, on which its work is based.
In November 1996 the German version ("Verschollene Werke") was finally out of the printing press. According to an informal agreement reached with the German Foreign Ministry, "Verschollene Werke" was distributed to museums and cultural institutes throughout the Federal Republic of Germany by the two offices responsible for the recovery of the German spoils of war: the "Dokumentationsstelle des Bundesministerium des Inneren" in Berlin and the "Koordinierungsstelle der Länder" in Bremen. The results of this effort are not yet definitely known. The agreement with Germany foresees a friendly discussion at the end of the exercise to decide which of the identified works will remain in Germany and which will be returned to Italy.
We are nevertheless aware of the presence in the Berlin "Antikensammlung" of four statues, formerly in Göring´s Karinhall villa. In a museum in Lower Saxony there is since 1956 a huge painting, formerly of the Italian Embassy in Berlin, left behind in their barracks by a British regiment. The quest for other missing paintings from the Italian Embassy in Berlin has been moved to London.
Not via London, via Paris another painting of the Italian Embassy in Berlin ended up in the Wadsworth Atheneum of Hartford, Ct. Apparently sold in 1945 by Russian soldiers to a Wagon-lit employee, the "Bath of Bethsheba" by Jacopo Zucchi was offered by the same Wagon-lit employee to the Italian Embassy in Paris in 1947. The bureaucratic procedure for disbursing the 30,000 lire requested to the Italian government for the return of the painting was not positively concluded. The painting was subsequently sold to a Parisian art dealer and bought in good faith by the Wadsworth Atheneum in 1965. In 1970 it was identified as the masterpiece formerly in the Italian Embassy in Berlin by the Italian art expert Federico Zeri.
Letters were sent to all the main armor collections around the world until a curator gave clear indications of the American private collection where it was held. The Commissione Interministeriale approached the collector, Ambassador Ronald Lauder, who had bought it, in perfect good faith, on the art market in 1986. Ambassador Lauder, a true lover of the arts, immediately returned the shield to the Italian Consulate General in New York.
In December 1996 the two relevant Ministers, Dini of Foreign Affairs and Veltroni of Cultural Heritage, signed a new joint decree renewing the life of the Commissione Interministeriale until 31.12.1997. Currently a new review of its activities is under way.
According to its results, it will be decided on the future activities of the Commissione Interministeriale or, its main task having been accomplished, whether the quest for the Italian cultural heritage lost during the Second World War will be left to the "Comitato per le Restituzione" established by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1994.
Mario Bondioli Osio, President of the
1997 has been until now a very quiet year compared to the preceding ones. Nothing really important has happened in the field of documentation or information on lost works of art. So our aim to publish a list of missing works of art has not been achieved.
The international collaboration in the field brought together representatives from different countries in Paris in November 1996, but one day was really too short to have important exchanges on a personal basis. The main interest was focused on the problem of the MNR paintings in the Louvre and so the international aspects were of lesser interest to the participants.
The Benelux collaboration suffers from the departure of our Belgian colleague, Jacques Lust. We would like to thank him for all he did in this field and we hope that this loss will not bring to an end an exemplary collaboration based on friendship and a frank exchange of information. We wish him all the best in his new job.
The information we are still waiting for from Russia has not yet arrived, but we try and hope that in the end we will get what we are waiting for.
There are rumors that one of the paintings that disappeared at the end of the war in a castle in Italy, belonging at that time to the Prince of Luxembourg, has re-appeared in an auction in Austria. We hope that our Italian friends can find out more about this.
We think that the time has come to bring people together once more to see what has been achieved since we met in Bremen in 1994. One should try and organize a meeting in 1998.
Paul Dostert, Historian, Ministry of Culture, Luxembourg
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