Jewish community becomes possessor of looted art if owners are undetectable

Much art belonging to Jewish owners was looted by Germans during the war. That art must now return to the Jewish community, the cabinet announced today.

“Jews were forced to sell their art under often appalling conditions. The moral order is to do justice to it. The works that we cannot return and of which we can no longer find the next of kin of the rightful owners, they are repossessed. to the Jewish community”, D66 minister Ingrid van Engelshoven of Education, Culture and Science told news hour.

In order to trace the mostly Jewish owners or their heirs, the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands will re-examine all more than 3,700 works of art. After that, the art will be managed by a Jewish (heritage) institution and eventually it will become the property of the Jewish community. The works are exhibited, among other things, to keep the memory of the Second World War alive.

The Central Jewish Consultation (CJO) calls the decision a breakthrough. Ronny Naftaniel of the CJO: “We are very happy with that, because this is the most righteous thing. They have been stolen from the Jewish community and they should also get it back”.

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The State manages the more than 3,700 art objects that were returned to the Netherlands by the Allies after the war. It concerns paintings, drawings, furniture, crockery and carpets. The government was instructed to track down the owners and return the art. In many cases this was not successful.

The works of art have been brought together in the so-called Netherlands Art Property Collection, which is managed by the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands. The art is currently partly in the depot of the Collection Center Netherlands and partly on loan to museums.

Paintings only ‘guest’ in the museum

For example, a number of works hang in the Mauritshuis. The museum indicates with a sign that it was looted by the Germans or sold under duress during the war: “It is important to show that such a painting is not the property of the museum or the state and that we that it becomes clear that these are paintings that are guests here, but do not reside here permanently,” says Edwin Buijsen, head of collections at the Mauritshuis.

The Kohnstamm Committee wrote last year about the return of Jewish looted art a critical report. The state itself should be much more active in looking for the original owners and their next of kin. Criticism that Minister Van Engelshoven has taken to himself: “In fact, as a government we are a bit too passive about it and what we want is an active government that informs people and that also actively investigates itself”.

Eventually there will be objects left of which the owner and the next of kin can no longer be found. The Centraal Joods Overleg estimates that the owner of many hundreds, possibly even a thousand objects will no longer be traceable. To make all available information about Jewish looted art more accessible, a new website has been launched today: wo2.collectienederland.nl.

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