Just when you are enjoying that beautiful impressionist painting on your wall while sitting comfortably on that Louis XV chaise longue, a letter arrives from a well-known auction house, informing you that both that painting and that chaise longue may have been looted during WWII.

How is that possible? You bought both objects at that same impeccable auction house, which is now informing you that their provenance research was not watertight after all. In the same letter, the auction house reassures you that there is nothing to worry about and that they are investigating the situation, while the idea rushes through your head that Nazis - the essence of evil! – may have looted these items from the home of a persecuted family. The letter from the auction house continues with the request asking you if you would agree to share your contact information with the heirs of the alleged despoiled owner. Are you still sitting comfortably on that Louis XV chaise longue?

This is not a fantasy. Nazi-looted art, furniture, jewellery, and many other types of looted objects are still regularly offered for sale on the art market. It is possible that the sellers of these items were not able to establish whether a particular object was stolen before offering it for auction, but the question often arises whether the sellers should have been suspicious and should actually have withdrawn such an object from the auction.

In any case, the buyer cannot simply blame the auction house and ignore the issue, especially if the buyer is well-versed in the field of fine art and would have been able to verify the provenance as well. If there is merit to the claim of the despoiled person’s heirs, then the buyer and the auction house must seek a solution.

For the buyer, it can be a solution to return the item to the auction house and ask for a refund, if this is still possible. The time limit to do so varies from country to country, from between several months to several years, from the date of the sale. Naturally, it stands to reason that auction houses should offer their clients more time to return any acquired items that were potentially looted by the Nazis, particularly if it is evident that the auction house could have done more thorough research about an object with a clearly suspicious provenance history.

The reality of the situation, however, is that once a looted item is sold at a public auction, the auction house and the current possessor only rarely help to seek a solution. Companies such as Mondex Corporation, which specializes in helping clients recover works of art and other assets that were looted during WWII, are often stymied by auction houses after finding out that a looted object was sold at auction.



A famous portrait with a lamp shone on it, symbolizing Mondex Corporation’s goal to shed light on Nazi-stolen art

Kamila Gourdie, President of Mondex said that “for lower value items the process is almost always the same; Mondex writes to the auction house, informing the auction house about the facts which show that a sold item was looted. The auction house responds that they can forward this information to the buyer, hoping for a reply. Asking for the contact details of the buyer is futile because of privacy restrictions. Excluding some rare exceptions, this is where the communication normally comes to an end. For higher-value items, though, it may make sense for claimants to file a claim against the auction house to compel it to disclose information about the consignor and the buyer. Then further action can usually be taken.”

One would think that the fact that the Nazis may have looted an auctioned object
should be sufficient for either the auction house or the buyer to seek a solution. But that is merely an idealistic point of view. In these cases, auction houses often hide behind the privacy of their clients, and clients often hide behind the fact that they do not have to share their contact details with claimants.

As a result, the possessor can often keep a looted item stashed away, in the hope that no one will make the whereabouts public. This should change, sooner than later, keeping in mind that in 2017, a US court concluded that the organized plunder of Jewish property by Nazis was “part of the genocide of the Jewish people during the Holocaust and, accordingly, violated international law” (Philipp v. Fed. Republic of Ger., 248 F. Supp. 3d 59 (D.D.C. 2017).

Are you still sitting comfortably on that Louis XV chaise longue? You can still act. Contact the auction house or the claimants. Discuss the situation. Find a solution, and the next time you buy something at an auction, ask for the auction house to indemnify you from any possible future claims. Such protection may encourage auction houses to invest more resources into more thorough provenance research and a welcome change for us all.