A painting stolen from a Jewish art collector by Nazis during the Second World War has been recovered in the home of relatives of well-known Dutch SS collaborator Hendrik Seyffardt and is now in the hands of a Dutch journalist, art detective Arthur Brand told Global News.
The renowned painting titled Portrait of a Young Girl by Dutch artist Toon Kelder belonged to the looted Goudstikker collection and is believed to have remained for years in the home of Seyffardt’s descendants, according to Brand, who described the discovery as “the most bizarre case of my entire career,” The Guardian reported.
Seyffardt collaborated with the Nazis during Hitler’s invasion of the Netherlands and led a volunteer Waffen-SS unit on the Eastern Front before he was assassinated in 1943.
Seyffardt was given a Nazi state funeral in The Hague and received a wreath sent by Hitler.
Jacques Goudstikker, a famed Dutch-Jewish art collector and owner of the painting, died while attempting to flee the invasion, leaving behind more than 1,000 works.
In 2006, his family successfully reclaimed 200 Nazi-looted items that had since come under the control of the Dutch government, according to the Contemporary Jewish Museum.
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The case is similar to a discovery made last year when a Nazi-looted painting — also belonging to the Goudstikker collection — was found at a home in Argentina, where thousands of notorious Nazis and war criminals fled after the war.
During the more recent Dutch discovery, Brand told Dutch and British media that he was approached by a man who claimed to be a descendant of Seyffardt and said the painting had been hanging in the hallways of the SS collaborator’s granddaughter’s house.
According to The Guardian, Seyffardt’s granddaughter said the painting was “Jewish looted art, stolen from Goudstikker. It is unsellable. Don’t tell anyone.”
The family member then hired Brand, a well-known art detective, who told Dutch outlet De Telegraaf that they felt ashamed and believed the artwork should be returned to its rightful owners.
According to the newspaper, the Seyffardt family was discussing whether to return the item, as they claimed they were unaware it had been stolen.
“I received it from my mother. Now that you confront me like this, I understand that Goudstikker’s heirs want the painting back. I didn’t know that,” a relative reportedly told the outlet.
Brand’s investigation verified the painting’s authenticity and traced the sale of the item to an auction in 1940, where he deduced that Seyffardt had bought the piece from senior Nazi official Hermann Göring, who he said had obtained the entire collection during its initial looting, according to the Dutch news agency.
“The family member sees public exposure as the only way to hopefully return the painting to the Goudstikker heirs, where it rightfully belongs,” Brand told the outlet.
He confirmed to Global on Tuesday that the painting had been handed over to a Dutch reporter and was set to be returned to its rightful owners.
Last week, another Nazi-looted artwork was put on display for the first time at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris as part of France’s reckoning with Nazi-era looting. The gallery is the first in the museum’s history to be given over to the orphaned masterpieces of the Nazi era.
The painting by Belgian artist Alfred Stevens was originally earmarked for Hitler’s planned museum in Linz, Austria. But by 1943, it was reassigned to Hitler’s mountain home in the Bavarian region of Germany. The museum was never built following Germany’s defeat.
No heir has ever come forward to claim the painting, and no one knows who owned it before 1942.
— With files from The Associated Press
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