The German state has allegedly concealed the dubious provenance of nearly 1,000 works of art to avoid restitution claims
The German state of Bavaria should allow UNESCO to handle and investigate the scandal involving Nazi-looted art, Russian historian Ilya Altman has told RT.
His comments follow a recent Sueddeutsche Zeitung report alleging that the Bavarian State Painting Collections (BStGS) deliberately concealed information on at least 1,000 works of art with questionable origins to avoid restitution claims.
According to internal documents obtained by the newspaper, 200 works – including pieces by Paul Klee and Pablo Picasso – were labeled ‘red’, indicating confirmed Nazi loot taken from mostly Jewish owners during World War II. Another 800 were marked ‘orange’ as suspected of being looted. The assessment was completed in 2020, but the report claimed that no efforts had been made to return the works. Also, since Germany signed the Washington Principles in 1998, pledging to restore Nazi-looted art, Munich museums have only returned 24 pieces, the outlet claimed.
The BStGS denied the allegations, but the controversy has prompted responses from German Culture Minister Claudia Roth, who ordered an investigation, and Bavaria’s arts and science minister, Markus Blume, who pledged to form an independent task force to assess whether the BStGS intentionally hid the provenance of the pieces.
Altman, the co-chairman of the Russian Research and Educational Holocaust Center in Moscow, said the fact that the report was acknowledged by the authorities shows that the problem with the restitution of Nazi-looted art at the BStGS is severe.
“The German Culture Minister has acknowledged this issue and promised an investigation, which in itself indicates the recognition of the severity of the situation and the fact that this questionable behavior by museum staff cannot go unpunished,” he told RT on Friday.
The historian, who previously worked on restitution cases involving Holocaust survivors, warned that the problem may be larger than reported, as stolen works are sometimes deliberately hidden in storage to avoid their return.
While stressing that restitution is “a question of historical justice,” Altman said bureaucratic hurdles in various countries make it difficult to claim stolen works decades after they were taken. He added that in past restitution cases, the German authorities were often uncooperative and demanded unreasonable evidence, such as the names of the Nazi soldiers who seized the items.
“We know very well that parting with artworks that form the pride of a collection is very difficult,” he said, suggesting that some institutions intentionally stall the process. Altman proposed that UNESCO, the UN’s science and culture agency, should investigate the BStGS case.
“This issue should be addressed by UNESCO… to ensure that this painful legacy of the Nazi past is eliminated and justice prevails,” he stated.
