Kandinsky sale will fund search for art stolen by Nazis
THE SALE of a Wassily Kandinsky masterpiece will fund a family’s search for art that was extorted from them by the Nazis during the Second World War.
The 1910 work Murnau mit Kirche II was once owned by Jewish high-society couple Johanna and Siegbert Stern, who did not survive Adolf Hitler’s murderous regime.
The painting, valued at £37million, was recently rediscovered and returned to the descendants of the couple, who are now auctioning the piece through Sotheby’s and plan to use part of the proceeds to fund a search for more artworks taken from their family.
The direct heirs of the Stern family, now living across Europe and America, said: “Though nothing can undo the wrongs of the past … the restitution of this painting that meant so much to our great-grandparents is immensely significant to us. It is an acknowledgement and partially closes a wound that has remained open over the generations.”
The Sterns were members of elite social circles in 1920s Berlin and amassed a collection of more than 100 works by such masters as Auguste Renoir and Edvard Munch. Siegbert died under Nazi rule in 1935 and his wife, Johanna, fled to the Netherlands amid the intensifying persecution.
After Holland was invaded by Nazi forces, she was forced to sell off her art collection firstly for a visa, and then simply to survive. She went into hiding in 1942 but was eventually captured and murdered in Auschwitz in 1944.
The artworks which once belonged to her family, including other works by the Russian painter Kandinsky, became dispersed. Then, in 2013, a Kandinsky painting in the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, in the Netherlands, was identified as being originally from the Stern collection.
In 2022, the decision was taken to return it to the descendents of the couple whose collection was extorted. This painting is now set to be sold by Sotheby’s in March, with the proceeds divided between 13 family members, with some money pledged to fund further searches for artworks from the Stern collection.
Helena Newman, chairman of Sotheby’s Europe, said: “Kandinsky’s Murnau period came to define abstract art for future generations, and the appearance of such an important painting … is a major moment for the market and for collectors.
“Its restitution after so many years allows us finally to reconnect this remarkable painting with its history, and rediscover the place of the Sterns and their collection in the glittering cultural milieu of 1920s Berlin.”