Posted on 01/26/2022 11:29:25 AM PST by ChicagoConservative27
When she was growing up in Paris, Pauline Baer de Perignon was always told the same story about her great-grandfather, Jewish art collector Jules Strauss.
Strauss — a German Jew living in Paris — owned a trove of Impressionist pictures by Renoir, Degas, Monet and many others. But the stock market crash of the 1930s forced him to sell much of his collection, leaving his heirs nothing. He died in 1943 of old age.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
What a beautiful painting.
Indeed. Amazing that something like that sells for only $1.5 million while some modern no talent hack can sell “art” for $100 million.
Money laundering will do that.
Now that’s what I call reparations:-)
Maybe we could confiscate some from George Soros.
There is a book Ivan Lindsay, titled “A History of Loot and Stolen Art: From Antiquity Until the Present Day”.
It is rather comprehensive in covering what the Nazis did in terms of stealing artwork. Fascinating stories. Absolutely unbelievable and rather depressing. Not saying it covers everything stolen, but the Germans had such an obsession for record-keeping that there is a lot of documentation.
BTW - it seems like a lot of the stuff that was not recovered may have ended up in the former Soviet Union.
The documentary you might be referring to is “The Rape of Europa”. It came out in 2006. The book came out in 1994. Naturally, the book is superior to the film.
I was astounded at what the Nazis did to Europe’s fine arts. I had been aware of it before the book and movie but didn’t really absorb the level to what the theft went.
I can’t be help think that somewhere in some cave (or caves) in Europe are a number of these treasures, still not discovered.
clarification: There is a book by Ivan Lindsay, ...
I've always believed that SOB helped himself to some of the stuff he was helping to collect from the Jews. I'm sure the guy he was working with, his so-called "protector", told him to find something he liked, and to pocket it, or he fingered stuff himself on the sly. I highly doubt he was penniless after the war.
Or kept hidden from the public in the homes of Nazi descendants.
Then the Soviets stole our family house, apartment building, and factories when they invaded Danzig in early 1944. My dad and Opa tried hard to get reparations, but nothing. The whole family fortune went POOF!
“...while some modern no talent hack can sell “art” for $100 million.”
It’s called modern day money laundering, or in Hunter Biden’s case it’s called bribery, kickbacks and payoffs.
There’s a retired old and gas lawyer in (of all places) Midland Texas who has been carefully suing owners of art stolen from his grandfather who was an art dealer (and had careful tax records).
It’s a pretty amazing collection on view for the public.
Hundreds of works, heavy on Picasso and Matisse, but all sorts of things.
Yeah, but they’ve been dying and kids put it up for auction.
And, viola!
Except it wasn’t stolen. Her grandfather himself noted he sold the piece in 1941. I agree with the museum that its history is “complicated”
Yeah, but she then has to divvy up the sale amount realized to 20 relatives. So, that will result in 50 to 75 thousand per relative, if the estimated amount is realized.
There is a black & white movie called “The Train”.
Starring Burt Lancaster.
True story about the Nazi’s trying to move artwork into hiding before the Allies get control.
VERY GOOD MOVIE
Sadly, much was destroyed as well.
There was a book that came out maybe fifteen years ago regarding the hunt for the legendary Amber Room, a gift to the Tsar that was stolen from Leningrad in 1941 and last seen in Konigsberg in early 1945. The authors’ conclusion, based on records from Russian archives, was that the Room’s panels, and three of its four mosaics, had been inadvertently destroyed during the Soviet taking of the city...and, ironically, by the Soviet troops themselves.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.