[CPProt.net] Poland renews claim tolooted art

[MusSecNetworkCulPropProtNet]

Poland renews claim to looted art

By JOE MILICIA
The Associated Press

CLEVELAND - Polish officials say legal documents compiled in a new book
bolster their ownership claim of drawings by Renaissance master Albrecht
Durer that were looted by the Nazis during World War II.

The 27 drawings were stolen from the Ossolinski Institute in present-day
Lviv, Ukraine, which was once part of Poland, and sold on the international
art market after the war ended.

They are now owned by major museums and collections in the United States and
Europe, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art
Institute of Chicago and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Mo.
In 1952, the Cleveland Museum of Art bought two of the drawings: "The Dead
Christ" and "The Ascension." It purchased "Head of a Man in a Cap" in 1963.

Harold Holzer, senior vice president for external affairs at the
Metropolitan, said last week that the museum believes it acquired its two
Durer drawings in a fair manner, citing a 2001 ruling by a State Department
special envoy for Holocaust issues.

But Holzer said the museum will examine the book and revisit the issue.

"We believe that we owe our public and the people who took the pains to
assemble this document the courtesy of intelligent review to see if it sheds
any new light on this issue," Holzer said.

The Cleveland Museum issued a statement saying that it is reviewing the book
and "will respond appropriately."

The new book, "The Fate of the Lubomirski Durers," was published by the
Society of the Friends of the Ossolinski Institute with support from the
American Council of Polish Culture.

"For the first time, all documents related to the case were put together and
translated from different languages into plain English," said Boguslaw
Winid, deputy chief of the Polish Embassy in Washington.

Winid said the documents, some dating back to the 19th century, track the
complicated history of the drawings, which were taken in 1941 from the
Ossolinski Institute in Lviv, which was then in Poland.

After the war, the U.S. military found the drawings in an Austrian salt mine
and gave them to a descendant of the original owner, Prince Heinrich
Lubomirski, a wealthy landowner. The descendant, Georg Lubomirski, sold
them.

Polish scholars say documents in the new book show that the Ossolinski
Institute should have received the drawings, not Lubomirski.

Questions about their ownership involve the changing of national borders in
Eastern Europe: both Ukraine and Poland have said they own the drawings and
want them back.

Durer, who died in 1528, combined the discoveries of Italian painters with
the tradition of his homeland in his works, which also included engravings
and paintings.

Winid said he hopes the museums will evaluate the book and reach a
compromise with Poland. 

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/artsentertainment/2002163778_lootedart
31.html