Tag Archives: Jewish

New issue of Art Antiquity and Law published

Posted on: January 22, 2021 by Ruth Redmond-Cooper

The December issue of Art Antiquity and Law has now gone to press and will be available in a few days. We hope the slight delay can be forgiven because this is our 100th issue of the journal, which is surely worthy of celebration (even during these rather un-celebratory times). If you subscribe to the […]

Restituted Brueghel sold at Sotheby’s

Posted on: July 7, 2016 by Alexander Herman

A little-discussed restitution of a still life by Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568-1625) led to an important sale at Sotheby’s London last night. The work, Still Life of Flowers in a Stoneware Vase, had once belonged to Baron Alphonse von Rothschild and had been kept at his castle in Schillersdorff, Silesia (now Silherovice, Poland). A forced transfer […]

Two important recommendations on Nazi-era loot

Posted on: September 24, 2015 by Alexander Herman

The Spoliation Advisory Panel, the UK body that hears disputes relating to Nazi-looted art held in national collections, has delivered two important reports this month. The first is a follow-up on an earlier 2014 recommendation that the Tate return a Constable painting, ‘Beaching a Boat, Brighton’, to the descendants of the painting’s original owner, Baron Hatvany of Hungary. The Baron had […]

Art law on film: Woman in Gold

Posted on: April 16, 2015 by Alexander Herman

‘What do you know about art restitution?’ ‘Not a thing.’ The question comes from Maria Altmann, played by Helen Mirren, and the answer is from her lawyer, Randol Schoenberg, played by Ryan Reynolds, in Woman in Gold, the film dramatising Altmann’s quest for the return of five Gustav Klimt paintings that had been taken from her family during the […]

The Swiss foundation that “inherited” Nazi loot

Posted on: October 21, 2014 by Alexander Herman

A recent dispute has arisen over the sale of artworks, pitting the relatives of two Jewish victims of the Nazis against a Swiss foundation that has been laying claim to assets once owned by the couple. The convoluted saga has been recounted by the New York Times. It involves the extensive art collection of Berlin metals broker Norbert Levy, a collection which […]