MFA wins Kokoschka ruling
The Museum of Fine Arts has won a lawsuit it filed to establish its legal title to a valuable 1913 painting by Oskar Kokoschka. The judgment in US District Court for the District of Massachusetts seemingly settles a dispute that began in 2007, when attorneys for Claudia Seger-Thomschitz, an Austrian woman, demanded the return of the work from the museum.
Her lawyers contended that Jewish art collector Oskar Reichel, one of her ancestors, had sold the painting under duress in Nazi-occupied 1939 Vienna.
Here's a story I wrote about this dispute.
But U.S. District Judge Rya W. Zobel, in a decision filed this week, stated that the three-year statute of limitations period on such claims has passed. In addition, she wrote that it’s not clear whether the transfer of the painting to Kallir was illegitimate, as Seger Thomschitz alleged, and that the witnesses with first-hand knowledge of the transaction are now dead.
"Two Nudes (Lovers)" has hung at the MFA almost continuously since 1973. It is a self-portrait with Alma Mahler (wife of the composer Gustav Mahler), with whom the artist had an affair. In recent years, other Kokoschka works have sold at auction for as much as $1 million.
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The MFA released a statement about the judgement about the painting, which was given to the museum in 1973 by Sarah Reed Blodgett.
Museum Director Malcolm Rogers has this to say:
"We are pleased with the court’s ruling acknowledging the MFA’s clear title to the painting," he said. "The MFA conducted a year and a half long comprehensive investigation of the work’s provenance, seeking documentation of the various transactions and changes of ownership in the painting’s almost 100-year history. We are satisfied and grateful that the judge has reaffirmed the Museum’s rightful ownership of the work."
Two Nudes (Lovers)
Oskar Kokoschka (Austrian, 1886–1980)
1913
Oil on canvas
*Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Bequest of Sarah Reed Platt
*Photograph © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
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Ewww.... This is art? The dude guy weird me out.
MFA must be very proud of this theft. How much did the judge get?
It's "statute of limitations," though "statue of limitations" does sound more artful...
MFA, shame on you!
Share the results of MFA's "comprehensive investigation of the work’s provenance"
with the public. We have a right to know.
From the MFA's page on the painting on its website:
Provenance/Ownership History: Please note: The history of ownership is not definitive or comprehensive, as it is under constant review and revision by MFA curators and researchers.
About 1914/1915, sold by the artist to Oskar Reichel (b. 1869 - d. 1943), Vienna [see note 1]; February, 1939, transferred by Reichel to Otto Kallir (b. 1894 - d. 1978), Galerie St. Etienne, Paris and New York [see note 2]; 1945, sold by Galerie St. Etienne, New York, to the Nierendorf Gallery, New York; 1945, sold by Nierendorf to Silberman Galleries, New York; 1947/1948, probably sold by Silberman to Sarah Reed (Mrs. John) Blodgett, later Sarah Reed Platt (d. by 1972), Grand Rapids, Portland, Oregon and Santa Barbara; 1973, bequest of Sarah Reed Platt to the MFA. (Accession Date: April 11, 1973)
NOTES:
[1] Dr. Oskar Reichel, an admirer and collector of Kokoschka's work, also knew him personally and almost certainly acquired this painting directly from him. Tobias G. Natter, Die Welt von Klimt, Schiele und Kokoschka: Sammler und Mäzene (Cologne, 2003), 254, suggests it was acquired around 1914/1915. The painting was first published as being in Dr. Reichel's collection by Paul Westheim in Das Kunstblatt 1 (1917), p. 319.
[2] On February 1, 1939, Reichel transferred the painting--along with four other Kokoschka paintings--to the dealer Otto Kallir, who at that time ran the Galerie St. Etienne in Paris. Kallir exhibited it in Paris that spring and brought it to the United States later that year. After his arrival in the United States, he paid Reichel's two sons, who had already immigrated to North and South America, for the paintings. Kallir opened a branch of his Galerie St. Etienne in New York and exhibited this work often between 1940 and 1945.
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