No question, the family should get it. The people had to sell it at gunpoint. Being under that kind of duress makes the title fraudulent.
A lot of Europe’s elites grew wealthy on stolen Jewish money and property.
the painting...
As I understand it, the Nazis were meticulous in doing everything legally according to their laws. Jews were not allowed to own fine art and were required by law to sell the art for Nazi state bonds that they were allowed to get the interest from—assuming they were still alive. When they disappeared into the camps, the bonds reverted to the Nazi state.
The Nazis were all about making money from their victims, from their art, furniture, kitchen utensils down to the rags they wore before murdered.
Of course the family should get the art back.
California has a Bill for everything
The heirs should get it, but the California law is dubious.
Isn’t this similar to an exit tax to leave a country? The guy received money, he got to leave, and likely saved his life.
How much did the Germans pay versus the actual value in 1939? I wonder how many transactions occurred between 1945 and 2024. Do all of them get unrolled? Seems unfair if it is not the case. Seems like the lawyers are the ones making the money.
Not sure how a recent law applies to all transactions that occurred decades ago.
Camille Pissaro was one of the “Gang of Four” who founded the Impressionist movement, the most notable art movement since the Renaissance. It beggars belief that any art museum could have bought a Pissaro without first executing their due diligence and confirming its authenticity, which would necessarily include fully documenting the painting’s provenance.
They should start with charging whoever negotiated the purchase of the painting on the museum’s behalf with trafficking in stolen art, and see if that changes their attitude as to its rightful ownership.
The Simpsons, grandpa Simpsons war artwork
the flying hellfish
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDAJ67F2L4E
The painting has been on display in the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid since 1992. The museum owns the painting. "In 1958, a German court awarded Lilly Cassirer Neubauer compensation of DM 120,000, the fair market value for the work."
If an American court ruled that the painting belonged to a descendant of the former owner who was awarded full market value for the work then considered as lost, how would the judgment be enforced? The California court could send a strongly worded letter to Spain. Perhaps there is a neo-con who would nuke Spain.
California is not a nation state. Spain is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rue_Saint-Honor%C3%A9,_dans_l%27apr%C3%A8s-midi._Effet_de_pluie
The painting has been displayed at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid since the museum opened in 1992. It had been bought by Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza at the Hahn Gallery in New York in 1976, from a US collector who bought it at the Knoedler Gallery in New York in 1952. In 1993, the baron sold it with the rest of his collection of 775 works to the Spanish state for US$350 million. A claim that the painting was Nazi looted art was dismissed by US federal courts in 2019 and 2020, on the grounds that the law of Spain applied. However, in September 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court accepted certiorari to review that decision, and on 21 April 2022, the Court ruled that the lower courts had incorrectly applied federal common law to apply Spanish law when they should have applied the law of California, and remanded the case for further proceedings. On January 9, 2024, the federal intermediate appellate court ruled in favor of the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza by holding that California would apply its law on conflict of laws in such a way as to defer to the law of Spain.Provenance
The painting was bought from Pissarro by the German businessman Julius Cassirer in 1897, and it was inherited by his son Fritz Cassirer and then by Fritz's wife Lilly. She remarried, but in 1939, as a German Jew, she was forced to sell the painting to Jakob Scheidwimmer, an official of the Reichskammer der bildenden Künste [de], for the low price of 900 RM to secure an exit visa, shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War. The painting was sold at an auction in Berlin in 1943 for 95,000 RM and disappeared from public view. In 1958, a German court awarded Lilly Cassirer Neubauer compensation of DM 120,000, the fair market value for the work.
In 2005, Lilly's grandson Claude Cassirer and other heirs filed a claim to recover the painting. In January 2011 the Spanish government denied a request by the US ambassador to return the painting, and in 2015 a Spanish court ruled that the painting belonged to the museum. In April 2019 the United States District Court for the Central District of California ruled that the painting belongs to Fundación Colección Thyssen-Bornemisza, on the basis that the baron and then the museum did not know it was looted art when they bought it. While that decision was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in 2020, in September 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court accepted certiorari to review the Ninth Circuit's decision. The case was heard on January 18, 2022[1] and on April 21, 2022, the Supreme Court, disagreeing with the decision of the Ninth Circuit's decision, vacated the judgement.[2]
Writing for a unanimous court, Justice Elena Kagan ruled that the lower courts had erred in applying federal common law to resolve the threshold choice of law question of whether the law of Spain or the law of California would control.[2] The high court held that when hearing non-federal claims under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, a federal court must apply state law to choice-of-law questions, which in this case meant the law of California.[2] Therefore, the case was remanded to allow the lower courts to apply the law of California governing conflict of laws, to determine whether a California state court would apply its own substantive property law to the ownership of the painting or would defer to the law of Spain.[2]
Following the Supreme Court's decision, the case was remanded to the Ninth Circuit, which tried to certify the choice-of-law question under California law to the Supreme Court of California. In August 2023, the state supreme court declined to hear that question and sent it back to the Ninth Circuit, meaning that the federal court was required to make an Erie guess as to how a California state court would resolve the question. On January 9, 2024, the Ninth Circuit ruled in favor of the foundation — holding that under the law of California (specifically, a 2010 landmark opinion of the Supreme Court of California involving Terrence McCann), ownership of the painting had to be decided under the law of Spain, rather than the law of California. The critical difference between the two is that the Civil Code of Spain allows for acquisitive prescription of personal property against the true owner, while California does not recognize adverse possession of personal property.[3]