by Amineddoleh & Associates LLC | Feb 11, 2019 |
The importance of cataloging art has been recognized by government agencies, academics, art preservation organizations, art market professionals, and art collectors. Its significance is recognized for various reasons. First, maintaining a record of art and archaeology adds to the historical information available to the public. This record contributes to our understanding the state of preservation and authenticity of sites and objects. Second, these records assist in developing the provenance (ownership history) of objects. In the instance that a work of fine art is stolen, ownership can be proven and the work can be traced by to the rightful owner. This record also prevents the sale and misattribution of forged works. And in the instance that an object or piece of an historical site was illicitly removed, a catalog can be used to pinpoint the provenience (find spot) of a piece or demonstrate the time of its removal. (This is important in terms of patrimony laws and international laws regulating antiquities.) Finally, a catalog assists in developing the historic significance of sites and objects and provides a deeper understanding of how these sites evolved over time and objects were purchased by collectors.
The ease with which fine art may be cataloged is starkly different than the way in which antiquities are recorded. Historical pieces may not have been discovered through government-sanctioned excavations. Objects looted from the ground have no paper trail. They may have gone unseen for perhaps millennia, making it impossible to catalog them prior to excavation. Needless to say, people involved in the trafficking of looted antiquities do not maintain an honest or accurate account of an object’s removal. Some dealers intentionally attach false information about these objects to avoid repatriation demands from governments.
However, objects that are legally uncovered or removed during official excavations are accurately recorded. Photographic records of sites provide us with a great deal of information about legal excavations, illicit treasure hunting, and a site’s transformation over time. In some cases, sites have been strictly protected while surrounding landscapes have changed (for example, the area surrounding Colosseum has dramatically changed over the past century). In other cases, sites have been destroyed.
Throughout the history of archaeology, the visual record of sites has included archaeological drawings and, more recently, photography. On view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is a fantastic exhibition that provides a glimpse at photographic archives, particularly in regions that have been heavily looted or destroyed by conflict. In Monumental Journey: Daguerreotypes of Girault de Prangey, an incredible collection of images from the Middle East are on view, including an extension collection of images from Syria, Egypt, and the Israel. The exhibition presents images from Girault’s three-year photographic expedition through the Eastern Mediterranean.
Wall text: “The renowned square minaret of the Umayyad Mosque (seen in the center of the larger image) collapsed in 2013 as conflict intensified during the Syrian Civil War”
Some of the most powerful images in the exhibition include photographs from Syria. They are intriguing not just for their beauty and intricacies, but because it is no longer possible to see those places. In two images, the city of Aleppo is majestically laid out across landscapes that includes arches, minarets, and beautiful ruins. Sadly, that cityscape no longer exists because it was heavily destroyed during the nation’s ongoing civil war. The Met provides background for these photos by stating that the city was once one of the most important trading cities in the Levant, and that the recognizable minaret of the Umayyad Mosque was obliterated in 2013 during conflict.
Similarly, the exhibit includes a photograph of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity and Convents. The city was damaged by earthquakes in the 19th century, and the church was later looted and fell into disrepair. The church now appears on UNESCO’s List of World Heritage in Danger. Girault’s photograph is an escape to another time and an opportunity to view the site prior to its plunder.
Interestingly, the exhibition notes that Girault was also a collector of antiquities, and the exhibit includes an Egyptian stela that was acquired by the photographer during his travels. Sadly, the exhibition notes that travelers amassed antiquities collections by purchasing archaeological treasures by local authorities.
by Amineddoleh & Associates LLC | Jan 27, 2019 |
© Julien Mignot for The New York Times
Last week, the NY Times featured an article about a 17th-century painting discovered behind a wall in a Parisian commercial space. The 10-by-20-foot canvas was discovered during the renovation of an Oscar de la Renta boutique. The mysterious painting is of a 17th-century nobleman and his entourage entering the city of Jerusalem. Through the use of art experts and historians, it was revealed that the work was painted in 1674 by Arnould de Vuez, a painter who worked with Charles Le Brun, the first painter to Louis XIV and designer of interiors of the Château de Versailles. Le Brun, with a reputation for involvement in duels, eventually fled France and made his way to Constantinople.
It is unclear how the canvas found its way to Paris and was hidden behind the wall of the boutique (it’s speculated that it may have been hidden during WWII). But most interestingly, art historian Stephane Pinta expertly traced the painting to a plate that was reproduced in “Odyssey of an Ambassador: The Travels of the Marquis de Nointel, 1670-1680,” by Albert Vandal. The book, written in 1900, recounted the travels of Louis XIV’s ambassador to the Ottoman Court. The discovery of the book, which includes a rotogravure of the rediscovered painting, reveals that the painting is of Marquis de Nointel arriving in Jerusalem.
After discovering the identity of the painting and its creator, the restoration process began. A team of specialists worked to restore the painting to its original state. However, investigators are still working to study the painting, understand its iconography, and trace its provenance and movements from inception through today.
The story demonstrates the importance of thorough provenance investigations. However, this is not the first case involving the discovery of art hidden behind a wall; there are a number of well-known instances involving artistic masterpieces hidden behind walls. Perhaps the most famous hidden work involves Leonardo’s famed “The Battle of Anghiari.” But the work isn’t hidden in the usual way. Some believe it was in place sight, on (not behind) a wall in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence. It’s believed that Leonardo’s now lost masterpiece (sometimes referred to as “the Lost Leonardo”) lies beneath a work by Giorgio Vasari. But with the work covered by another intact masterpiece, questions arise as to how to preserve these two dueling artworks.
Works are sometimes hidden due to criminal motivations. Fourteen years after two Van Gogh works were stolen from the artist’s eponymous museum in Amsterdam, officers in Italy’s Guardia di Finanza found the missing works in southern Italy. The paintings were hidden behind a wall in the home of a mafia boss.
Sometimes works are hidden due to family disputes and conflicting claims of ownership. In 2006, Sotheby’s sold a Norman Rockwell painting that had been hidden behind a wall by the painting’s owner. During their divorce, the owner of the work did not want his wife gaining possession of, or making copies of, “Breaking Home Ties.” He hid the painting behind the wall, but his sons discovered the artwork after their father’s passing.
There are a host of other stories involving the discovery of works hidden behind walls, even by the artists themselves. It is always exciting when a work is rediscovered.
by Amineddoleh & Associates LLC | Jan 22, 2019 |
Photo: © Mick Vincenz. © Kunst und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland GmbH
Earlier this month, a painting looted by the Nazis was returned to the heirs of the rightful owner. German officials returned Portrait of a Seated Woman, a work by Thomas Couture, to the heirs of Georges Mandel. The looted work was identified while on display as part of the former collection of Cornelius Gurlitt.
THE GURLITT COLLECTION
In November 2013, the world became aware of the Gurlitt Collection. The find was unprecedented, as the Gurlitt Family had hidden an extraordinarily valuable and unknown art collection for decades. The Gurlitts possessed over 1400 works, most of which were collected while Hildebrand Gurlitt worked as an art dealer for the Nazi Party.
In 1937, the Nazis began ransacking public collections for anything modernist to be displayed as “degenerate,” and to ultimately be sold abroad or destroyed. In 1937, the Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany issued a decree authorizing a commission to raid museums to select works for an exhibition of “degenerate” art. The Nazis confiscated thousands of works from museums and gathered them for “The Degenerate Art” exhibit. The works were displayed without a proper curatorial process, and some were even partially covered by pejorative slogans. After the exhibition, some objects were auctioned or sold, but thousands were destroyed in bonfires.
During this time, Hildebrand Gurlitt (Cornelius’ father), a collector in his own right, took the opportunity to steal works from collectors in Germany and France. Hundreds of works in the Gurlitt Collection are thought to be works declared as “degenerate,” while other works are suspected to have been the property of fleeing Jewish collectors. After Hildebrand Gurlitt gathered these works, he kept their existence a secret. When he passed away, the works went to family, unbeknownst to officials because the artwork did not go through the probate process.
DISCOVERY OF THE GURLITT COLLECTION
Decades later, in February 2012, based on a court order for tax-evasion allegations, the works were discovered and confiscated from Cornelius Gurlitt’s small apartment in Munich. At that point, a German provenance researcher examined the collection. The first task was to determine the identity of the works and artists, but there were countless unanswered questions about the art trove. How did these works make their way to the Gurlitt Family?
In the case of artworks bought from victims, there is legal precedent that dictates that works sold under duress are actually stolen. However, it is difficult to determine which works were stolen or were legitimately collected by Hildebrand Gurlitt. One of the difficulties in categorizing these works is the lack of information available about the objects. Each work is unique, and it is a complex task to determine the provenance (ownership history) of each object.
DIFFICULTIES RESTITUTING NAZI-LOOTED ART
Claimants (rightful owners or their heirs) must overcome the formidable task of proving ownership. When Jews and other victims of Nazi atrocities were forced to escape from their homes in fear, the ownership records of their art collections were not of the utmost importance. These people were fleeing for their lives, families were being torn apart, people were being murdered across a continent, and individuals were losing possession to every worldly object in their names. For this reason, the heirs of these victims face an uphill battle to recover property. These individuals face a formidable task—proving ownership without any documentation. And as time moves forward, Holocaust survivors pass away. Without their memories, the remaining heirs may be unaware of their families’ looted assets.
Yet even after the confiscation of the collection, the Gurlitt saga continued. Cornelius Gurlitt adamantly refused to return works from the collection to the legitimate owners, as he insisted that the works rightly belonged to him. And then on May 6, 2014, Gurlitt passed. In late 2014, it was revealed that he bequeathed the entire collection to a Swiss museum, Kunstmuseum Bern. The museum announced that it was “surprised and delighted” to have the paintings left to its collection. However, the museum recognized that the gift brought “a considerable burden of responsibility and a wealth of questions of the most difficult and sensitive kind, and questions in particular of a legal and ethical nature.” The museum ultimately accepted the gift, but committed to researching the artworks and cooperating in the restitution process for stolen works.
The difficulty in proving ownership is reflected in the small number of art restitutions. The Couture painting is only the fifth piece from the Gurlitt Collection to return to the rightful owners, and it is only the sixth work confirmed as looted by the Nazis. Interestingly, and luckily for the heirs, the painting was identified based on a distinctive mark– a tiny hole in the canvas that Mandel’s lover had described when she reported the work as stolen.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
For more information about the Gurlitt Collection, please find Monuments Men, Hidden Treasures, and the Restitution of Looted Art.
For more information about the Nazi Party and their destruction and theft of art, our founder Leila Amineddoleh contributed a chapter to Nazi Law: From Nurmeberg to Nuremberg.
by Amineddoleh & Associates LLC | Dec 24, 2018 |
2018 has been a busy and great year for Amineddoleh & Associates. We welcomed Claudia Quinones to our team, and she joined us just in time to work on some very exciting legal matters. Some of the highlights of our year include the following:
We wish our clients, colleagues, and friends a great holiday season and a happy, healthy, and successful new year!
by Amineddoleh & Associates LLC | Dec 19, 2018 |
Amineddoleh & Associates LLC 
is proud to be representing the Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Hellenic Republic (the Greek Ministry of Culture) in a lawsuit filed against it by Sotheby’s and one of the auction house’s consignors. The case was cited by Artsy as being one of the most important art law matters of 2018.
Artsy states, “It [the case] could set a startling precedent, discouraging foreign governments from raising the alarm about sales of potentially ill-gotten artifacts for fear of reprisal at a time when a great deal of attention is nonetheless trained on the trade in looted objects and efforts for repatriation.”
Disclaimer: The quotation by Artsy is not an endorsement of its statement.
The importance of cataloging art has been recognized by government agencies, academics, art preservation organizations, art market professionals, and art collectors. Its significance is recognized for various reasons. First, maintaining a record of art and archaeology adds to the historical information available to the public. This record contributes to our understanding the state of preservation and authenticity of sites and objects. Second, these records assist in developing the provenance (ownership history) of objects. In the instance that a work of fine art is stolen, ownership can be proven and the work can be traced by to the rightful owner. This record also prevents the sale and misattribution of forged works. And in the instance that an object or piece of an historical site was illicitly removed, a catalog can be used to pinpoint the provenience (find spot) of a piece or demonstrate the time of its removal. (This is important in terms of patrimony laws and international laws regulating antiquities.) Finally, a catalog assists in developing the historic significance of sites and objects and provides a deeper understanding of how these sites evolved over time and objects were purchased by collectors.
