Art News. Vasari Codex

gavel restitution schedule Feb 25, 2026 visibility 9 link 1 artist

georg kolbe museum to restitute nazi looted sculpture to heirs of holocaust victim 1234774497

The Georg Kolbe Museum in Berlin has announced the restitution of the 1922 bronze sculpture 'Tänzerinnen-Brunnen' (Dancers’ Fountain) to the heirs of its original owner, a Jewish art collector and insurance executive named Stahl. Following an extensive provenance investigation, the museum determined that Stahl was forced to sell his villa and the sculpture under Nazi persecution and economic coercion in 1941, shortly before he was deported and murdered at the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

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gavel restitution schedule Feb 5, 2026 visibility 5 link 3 artists

national gallery artemisia gentileschi provenance 1417675

The National Gallery in London is preparing to unveil Artemisia Gentileschi's 'Self-Portrait as Saint Catherine of Alexandria,' a major 2018 acquisition. However, the museum has quietly added the painting to its list of works that could have been looted during the Nazi era due to a gap in its provenance from 1615 to the 1940s, specifically concerning its ownership by the French Boudeville family during the war.

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gavel restitution schedule Nov 24, 2025 visibility 4 link 2 artists

msk ghent declines to return nazi looted painting 1234763332

The Museum of Fine Arts (MSK) in Ghent has refused to return Gaspar de Craye's Nazi-looted *Portrait of Bishop Triest* to the heirs of its original owner, Samuel Hartveld. An independent commission found the painting was sold under duress after the German occupation of Belgium in 1940, but concluded that Hartveld and his family were later financially compensated by the city, leading MSK to retain the work. Jewish groups EJA and JID are contesting the decision, arguing that international principles mandate restitution regardless of compensation.

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gavel restitution schedule Apr 25, 2025 visibility 3 link 4 artists

switzerland buhrle foundation settlement manet jewish heirs 1234739848

The foundation overseeing the Emil G. Bührle collection has reached a settlement with the heirs of Jewish collector Max Silberberg over Édouard Manet's painting *La Sultane* (c.1871), allowing the work to remain on view at the Kunsthaus Zurich. Bührle, a German Swiss industrialist who profited from arms sales to Nazi Germany and used slave labor, amassed a collection now known to include many Nazi-looted artworks. The settlement follows a 2021 report by Raphael Gross finding that over a quarter of the 205 loaned works likely belonged to Jewish owners, sparking public protests and artist Miriam Cahn's withdrawal of her works from the museum.

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