Judaica

Francis Warin, their representative, told Artcult, that a legal action was under way for the restitution of Georges Braque's «Guitar Player» stolen from Alphonse Kann's collection in 1940 and sold in 1981 by the Berggruen Gallery to the Georges Pompidou Museum of Modern art.

The Braque painting, considered as one of his most important Cubist works came in the possession of French dealer André Lefevre who kept it until 1964. Lefèvre, whose role during the war remains to be clarified, also gave three paintings by Juan Gris, believed to have belonged to Kann, to the Paris Museum of Modern Art and sold two other paintings by the same artist at auction in 1964.

Warin added that a major 1911 work by Fernand Léger titled «Chimney fumes on roofs», now in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, had also belonged to Kann who signalled its disappearance after his return to Paris in 1945.

Apparently, this Léger painting was sold at auction in Paris in October 1942 with works by Picasso, Miro and Francisco Bores, which were believed to have been in his collection.

«Chimney fumes on roofs» was purportedly purchased during the war by the Paris Louise Leyris Gallery, which sold it back to the Buchholz Gallery of New York before it was acquired by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.

Francis Warin said he was about to call for the return of that painting and added that he was certain that several other paintings from the Kann collection were in the possession of some U.S and foreign museums. He indicated that he recently discovered a 1921 painting by Picasso, “Head of Woman” in the Museum of Fine Arts of Rennes, Brittany.

Many works of art and paintings belonging to Jewish collectors were seized by the Nazis or the Vichy regime during the Second World War and so far the owners of some 2000 works recovered after 1945 have not been traced back.

The daily «Le Monde» reported on March 15th 1999 that a 1914 Fernand Léger painting, titled «Woman in red and green», had not yet been claimed by the heirs of French collector and dealer Leonce Rosenberg whose collection was seized by the Nazis in 1942 and sold to the German dealer Gustav Rochlitz in exchange against a painting by the Master of Frankfurt representing the Adoration of the Magi.

This Léger painting was recovered by French authorities but neither Léonce, who died in 1947, nor his brother Paul claimed its restitution. The heirs of the Rosenberg family have been unable so far to find a document that it effectively was in Leonce's collection while “Le Monde” suggested it might have been left in his care by another collector.

Referring to the World Jewish Congress' proposal to auction all unclaimed works of art which have remained under the custody of French museums, Henri Hadjenberg, Chairman of the Council of France's Jewish Institutions (CRIF) told “Le Monde” that such settlement was simply not a financial matter.

“The Crif is against the WJC proposal because there not many masterpieces among the 2000 paintings or so which have been left in the care of French museums. Most of these works belonged to Jewish families and the State should set up a fund to perpetuate the memory of the Holocaust and inform people about this tragedy. A special center, financed by the State in exchange of these paintings and with the equivalent of Jewish assets seized in French banks during the war and unclaimed so far, would be suitable.”