Italian police uncover 58 million worth in looted Art

[Thanas]

Link

Rome — Authorities on Wednesday unveiled what they said was a record haul of rare antiquities illegally looted from Italy and discovered during raids on Swiss warehouses belonging to a Sicilian former art dealer.

Police estimated the value of the 5,361 vases, kraters, bronze statues and frescoes at $58 million.

The works, from the 8th century B.C. to the 3rd century, were laid out Wednesday at the Terme di Diocleziano National Roman Museum and may go on public display before being returned to museums in southern Italy, from where they originated.

"This is by a long shot the biggest recovery in history in terms of the quantity and quality of the archaeological treasures," Carabineri Gen. Mariano Mossa told a news conference.

The items were found during an investigation into Basel-based art dealer Gianfranco Becchina and his wife, accused by prosecutors of being part of an antiquities trafficking network that involved "tombaroli" tomb raiders in southern Italy, dealers and buyers around the globe.

An email to Becchina's olive oil farm in Sicily was not immediately returned. Police said he was free after the statute of limitations expired on the charges. In a recent open letter responding to police accusations against him in Italy's La Repubblica newspaper, Becchina insisted on his innocence and said he had never been convicted, much less tried, and had never been able to defend himself.

In a press release, the carabineri said the investigation showed how dealers would forge provenance papers for the antiquities and create fictitious histories for them, so that museums and private collectors could in theory buy them in good faith.

As a result, perhaps more important than the antiquities themselves is that Italian authorities now have detailed documentation of Becchina's inventory, including photos and receipts, that was also found in the warehouses, police said.

Well done. I hope they nail the buyers of the looted art, whoever they might be.

[Irbis]

"This is by a long shot the biggest recovery in history in terms of the quantity and quality of the archaeological treasures," Carabineri Gen. Mariano Mossa told a news conference.

This might have been biggest if you count age of recovered art, but recent German find easily rivals if not beats it in cultural and monetary value.

Sadly, though, that one didn't have happy end, as it turns out Germany (unlike Austria and Italy) considers unalienable constitutional property rights of Nazi art looters to trump any rights of the victims and not only state institutions will help you hide the fact you ever had the looted art, if not for meddling press who discovered the police find by chance, it would have been quietly returned so that looter could have went back to his extravagant life style supported by auctioning off art pieces.

[Thanas]

What anti-German diatribe are you on now, potato?

[Grumman]

Well done. I hope they nail the buyers of the looted art, whoever they might be.

At some point, buying stolen goods in good faith has to not be a crime. If these guys had legal documents "proving" that they had come into possession of these items legally and thus that it was legal to buy them, at some point you have to say that the buyer fulfilled their obligation to avoid buying stolen goods despite the fact that the seller's countermeasures were sufficiently good to deceive them.

[Irbis]

I am referring to this case. If you find the Wiki overview too long, here, have an article:

Nazi trove in Munich contains unknown works by masters

In pictures: Long-lost art unveiled in Germany
Art stolen by Nazis found in Munich Watch
The unfinished art business of World War Two

Previously unknown artworks by masters are among more than 1,400 pieces found in a trove of Nazi-looted art in Munich, German officials say.

As slides of the paintings were shown at a news conference, an expert said the works had been seized from private individuals or institutions.

Previously unregistered works by Marc Chagall, Otto Dix, Max Liebermann and Henri Matisse were found.

Prosecutors said the issue of ownership was still being clarified.

There is no question that the Munich trove is extremely significant, a really important discovery. You could conceivably set up a museum with this lot.

The curator who has been cataloguing the collection says not only does it contain works we thought were destroyed, but some that we did not know existed. Art historians all over the world will be preparing to rewrite biographies of several modern artists.

The previously unknown Chagall is an exciting discovery, a highly valuable work of art. And the Otto Dix self-portrait, full of German expressionism, catches him at a moment shortly after the end of World War One when his art was reaching new heights. But now we are hearing there are Canalettos and a Courbet in there - so it is not just a collection of modern art.

What is frustrating is the drip-feeding of information from Germany. There are almost 1,400 works in this collection, yet they have only told us concrete details about two of them.

There still seems to be a cloak of secrecy around the whole affair. They are telling us they are not going to post the images online - so if you think you might have a claim, you have to approach them. It is extraordinary. Like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

The total value has been estimated at about 1bn euros (£846m; $1.35bn).

Reinhard Nemetz, head of the prosecutors' office in Augsburg, said that 121 framed and 1,285 unframed works had been seized in the flat of Cornelius Gurlitt in Munich in March of last year.

It was not yet clear if any offence had been committed, he added, stressing that the legal position was extremely complex.

Investigators, he said, had turned up "concrete evidence" that at least some of the works had been seized by the Nazis from their owners or had been deemed "degenerate".

A photo of a self-portrait by Otto Dix, revealed in Augsburg, 5 November
Marc Chagall painting revealed in Augsburg, 5 November
Painting attributed to Henri Matisse, revealed in Augsburg, 5 November

Art expert Meike Hoffmann said some of the works were dirty but they had not been damaged.

'Extraordinarily good'

"When you stand before the works and see again these long-lost, missing works, that were believed destroyed, seeing them in quite good condition, it's an extraordinarily good feeling," Ms Hoffmann said.

Art expert Meike Hoffmann: "An emotional discovery"

"The pictures are of exceptional quality, and have very special value for art experts. Many works were unknown until now."

Other artists whose works were found include Pablo Picasso and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, as well as Canaletto and Gustave Courbet.

The paintings were found in March of last year after Mr Gurlitt was investigated for tax evasion.

The framed pictures were stacked on a shelf, like in a museum storeroom while the unframed works were piled up in drawers, said customs official Siegfried Kloeble.

According to a report by Germany's Focus magazine, Mr Gurlitt, the reclusive son of an art dealer in Munich, would occasionally sell a picture when he needed money.

"We don't have any strong suspicion of a crime that would justify an arrest," said Mr Nemetz, adding that the current whereabouts of Mr Gurlitt were unknown.

Asked at the news conference why the German authorities had taken so long to reveal the paintings, the prosecutor said it would have been "counter-productive to go public" with the case earlier.

Mr Kloeble refused to say where the artworks were being stored.

Mr Gurlitt's father Hildebrand collected early 20th Century art regarded by the Nazis as un-German or "degenerate", and removed from show in state museums.

He was recruited by the Nazis to sell the "degenerate art" abroad but also bought privately.

After the war he told investigators that his collection had been destroyed during the Allied bombing of Dresden in 1945. He also said he had been persecuted himself for having a Jewish grandmother.

Resuming his work as a dealer, he died in a car crash in 1956.

A Jewish group has questioned the length of time it took Germany to unveil the artworks and called for them to be returned to their original owners.

"It cannot be, as in this case, that what amounts morally to the concealment of stolen goods continues," said Ruediger Mahlo, speaking for the Conference on Jewish material claims against Germany.

'Justice denied'

Stuart Eizenstat, a former US ambassador to the EU, told the BBC that time was running out, and the details of the artworks should be published.

"Victims of the Holocaust are aging, even the families of those who did not survive are of an age," he said.

"It's important that this be publicised. But the longer one goes... the more difficult it is for people to prepare potential claims... Justice delayed is justice denied."

However, prosecutors say it would not be proper procedure to put things on the internet and people who want to make a claim should contact them directly.

The BBC's Stephen Evans in Munich says that descendants of owners of art taken by German forces in occupied Europe may be able to make claims.

However, there are suggestions that art taken in Germany itself may not be reclaimable because of a 30-year statute of limitations.

Mr Mahlo said that private collections of such art under the Third Reich had been almost all Jewish.

However, auctioneers have argued that at least some of the works were purchased cheaply in 1938 by Mr Gurlitt's father from a collection of state-owned art.

In 1990, Cornelius Gurlitt auctioned works for 38,250 Swiss francs (31,000 euros) in Galerie Kornfeld, an auction house and gallery in the Swiss city of Bern.

In a statement quoted by Reuters news agency, Galerie Kornfeld said: "Cornelius Gurlitt inherited the works after the death of his mother Helene. Basically this is a case of undeclared inheritance."

Care to explain how you can (ignoring for a second the fact his dad was Nazi agent who looted, confiscated, or extorted whole collection) have undeclared 1 billion Euro inheritance, do not work one day, live extravagantly, and have German tax authorities never ask a single question despite two earlier investigations? Bribe or incompetence?

And since when being a fence for art looter that was later condemned for crimes against humanity 'buying the works legally' instead of being equally complicit and guilty? Even if we ignore Nazi-helped confiscations and extortions he took part in? Oh, I got it, I bet he "only followed orders" too

Or why prosecutor who found the art cache kept it hidden for 18 months while witnesses were dying, as noted, out of old age, instead of publishing list immediately? Then show colossal hypocrisy stating the real owners should have turned on psychic powers to detect the art is there and contacted him? And then make childish mistakes in leading the case making return of looted art all but inevitable?

Oh, and there is this bit:

Unlike in Austria, there is no law in effect in Germany requiring the return of Nazi-looted art, as long as the items in question can be proven to have, at any point in time, been legally acquired. As signatories of the 1998 Washington Agreement, Germany agreed that all of its public institutions would check their inventories for Nazi-looted goods and return them if found. However, this is on a strictly voluntary basis and, 15 years later, only very few museums and libraries have complied. Individuals are under no legal requirement whatsoever to return Nazi-looted art. Any failure on the part of the German government to return the rightful possessions of Cornelius Gurlitt may very well prove a violation of his constitutional property rights.

Boohoo, poor Germans, 70 years turns out to be a too short period for even simplest law concerning stolen art, much less returning anything. Which is triply rich seeing they both promised to do it 45 and 20 years ago, and were responsible for largest art looting and destruction in history

Who is the potato here, again?

[Thanas]

I am referring to this case.

Ah yes, the case where they waited to conclude their investigation before handing stuff back.

You know why it is illegal to give those paintings back? Because an ALLIED LAW passed by the Allied occupiers from 1949 declared the seizures legal and forbade such restitutions against private persons. You can even find it here:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MilRegG59.pdf
In fact, German authorities did everything they legally could. Heck, they even crossed the lines by illegally seizing the art in the first place. Which is why the prosecutors are now in trouble.

If you want to blame somebody, don't blame the German authorities, who did everything they could. The only ones at blame here are the allied occupiers who passed such idiotic laws in the first place.

Who is the potato here, again?

Still you. Inform yourself about the laws.