Boston Globe: Museum Fine Arts Boston Refuses To Release Research on Kokoschka Stolen From Oskar Reichel

Stolen Kokoschka at MFA Boston: Court Rules Claimants Too Late for Justice

The Boston Globe, in a piece here by veteran reporter Geoff Edgers who has reported on many Nazi art looting scandals involving the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, reports in a rather soft and indirect way that the museum is continuing to conceal its research on how a work by Oskar Kokoschka got from the Jewish Viennese dentist Oskar Reichel in February 1939 to the art dealer Otto Kallir.   Earlier coverage of the case here.

Otto Kallir was profiled in an article Dealer with the Devil by the New York Observer here.

In February 1939, Jews had declared their property to the Nazi Reich.  Vienna was in the grips of Adolph Eichmann, who was systematically despoiling them of all property.

The Boston Globe article states as follows:
She [Reed] does defend the MFA, which she says shares the results of all its Nazi-era provenance research on its website, on gallery labels, and in gallery talks. The only exception is when there is a legal matter that includes correspondence that is privileged.

Her understated approach is typical of Reed. She wants the evidence from her research to speak for itself without telling her boss, MFA deputy director Katherine Getchell, how to respond.
That makes perfect sense to Getchell.

“Her job is not to be a policymaker or decision maker,’’ said Getchell. “We want her focused on research and analysis and looking at the different options.’’

But the Boston Globe has glossed the point.  Victoria Reed has presented no evidence, only the most conclusory "results" of her alleged research.  The Museum of Fine Arts website states as follows here:

Provenance Research
Following this March 2007 claim [to the Kokoschka], the MFA thoroughly reviewed the claim to Two Nudes (Lovers) in accordance with its own Acquisitions Policy as well as the guidelines set forth by the American Association of Museums (AAM), the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD), and the Washington Principles of 1998 on Nazi-Confiscated Art. The Museum is committed to determining, on an ongoing basis, whether any work of art in its collection has ever been stolen, confiscated, looted, or otherwise unlawfully appropriated as a result of Nazi persecution without subsequent restitution. A leader in provenance research, the MFA makes ownership information available to the public through its website, mfa.org. During the past decade, the Museum has restituted a number of works of art to their rightful owners based on provenance research.

None of this research has been made public.  Instead, the Museum has published a five paragraph summary of the 'results' of its alleged research.  A sample of this conclusory "research" follows below:

By 1924, Reichel had developed a business relationship with Otto Kallir (b. 1894 - d. 1978), a Jewish art dealer who opened the Neue Galerie in Vienna in 1923. Reichel consigned Two Nudes (Lovers), along with other paintings by Kokoschka, for sale through Kallir in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1938, Kallir fled Vienna and turned the Neue Galerie over to his non-Jewish secretary. He opened a new gallery, the Galerie St. Etienne, in Paris. In February 1939, Reichel transferred ownership of five Kokoschka paintings—including Two Nudes (Lovers) —to Kallir, who exhibited them in his Paris gallery that spring. Later that year, Kallir emigrated to New York and opened a branch of the Galerie St. Etienne there. He exhibited Two Nudes (Lovers) frequently between 1940 and 1945, both in his New York gallery and in traveling exhibitions throughout the United States. From New York, Kallir sent money for the five Kokoschka paintings to Oskar Reichel’s two sons, Raimund and Hans, with whom he was in communication; they were living in South America and the United States, respectively.

Oskar Reichel was a Jew in Adolph Eichmann's Vienna.  His assets were logged and registered with the Nazis.  Nazi law prohibited Jews from making any transfers, and if any transfers were authorized, all of the proceeds went to the Reich.  How on earth could Reichel have tranferred ownership these assets to Kallir?    And even if he did, the 1946 Nullification Act, which voided transactions in property of Nazi persecutees, should have applied.  

Why has the MFA's researcher Victoria Reed failed to present her scholarship for peer review?  Historians are ethically mandated to do so.   Here is an excerpt from the American Historical Association's Statement on Professional Conduct

Professional integrity in the practice of history requires awareness of one's own biases and a readiness to follow sound method and analysis wherever they may lead.Historians should document their findings and be prepared to make available their sources, evidence, and data, including any documentation they develop through interviews. Historians should not misrepresent their sources. They should report their findings as accurately as possible and not omit evidence that runs counter to their own interpretation. They should not commit plagiarism. They should oppose false or erroneous use of evidence, along with any efforts to ignore or conceal such false or erroneous use.
Historians should acknowledge the receipt of any financial support, sponsorship, or unique privileges (including special access to research material) related to their research, especially when such privileges could bias their research findings. They should always acknowledge assistance received from colleagues, students, research assistants, and others, and give due credit to collaborators.

Historians should work to preserve the historical record, and support institutions that perform this crucial service. Historians favor free, open, equal, and nondiscriminatory access to archival, library, and museum collections wherever possible. They should be careful to avoid any actions that might prejudice access for future historians. Although they recognize the legitimacy of restricting access to some sources for national security, proprietary, and privacy reasons, they have a professional interest in opposing unnecessary restrictions whenever appropriate.

For another great example of museums professing to publish research, but in reality concealing it, please check out William D. Cohan's MoMA's Problematic Provenances in this month's ArtNews here

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Art Litigation: Nazi-Era Art Restitution - Westfied Scandal Unleashed By Museum of Fine Arts Boston

Eyeglasses from Jews murdered at Auschwitz courtesy Wikimedia Commons

As I posted yesterday, the Sixth Circuit decided to cloak Nazi actions in sovereign immunity in Westfield v. Federal Republic of Germany, my post of the decision here.   Walter Westfield was a successful Geman art dealer who was expropriated by the Nazis and murdered at Auschwitz.

In my post expressed my surprise that the Sixth Circuit did not recognize that U.S. courts were relieved of any restraints on their jurisdiction to unwind evil Nazi acts since the Second Circuit stripped the Nazis of sovereign immunity as of 1954 in the Bernstein v. N.V. Nederlansche-Americaansche case.

Additionally, the Sixth Circuit's decision in Westfield v Federal Republic of Germany seems to violate the Nuremberg Principles:

(lifted from Wikipedia)

Principle I "Any person who commits an act which constitutes a crime under international law is responsible therefor and liable to punishment."

Principle II  "The fact that internal law does not impose a penalty for an act which constitutes a crime under international law does not relieve the person who committed the act from responsibility under international law."
Principle III "The fact that a person who committed an act which constitutes a crime under international law acted as Head of State or responsible government official does not relieve him from responsibility under international law."
Principle IV "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him".
This principle could be paraphrased as follows: "It is not an acceptable excuse to say 'I was just following my superior's orders'".
Previous to the time of the Nuremberg Trials, this excuse was known in common parlance as "Superior Orders". After the prominent, high profile event of the Nuremberg Trials, that excuse is now referred to by many as "Nuremberg Defense". In recent times, a third term, "Lawful orders" has become common parlance for some people. All three terms are in use today, and they all have slightly different nuances of meaning, depending on the context in which they are used.
Nuremberg Principle IV is legally supported by the jurisprudence found in certain articles in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which deal indirectly with conscientious objection. It is also supported by the principles found in paragraph 171 of the Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status which was issued by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Those principles deal with the conditions under which conscientious objectors can apply for refugee status in another country if they face persecution in their own country for refusing to participate in an illegal war.
See also: Nuremberg Defense, Superior Orders, and Lawful orders
Principle V "Any person charged with a crime under international law has the right to a fair trial on the facts and law."
Principle VI "The crimes hereinafter set out are punishable as crimes under international law:
(a) Crimes against peace:
(i) Planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances;
(ii) Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the acts mentioned under (i).
(b) War crimes:Violations of the laws or customs of war which include, but are not limited to, murder, ill-treatment or deportation of slave labor or for any other purpose of the civilian population of or in occupied territory; murder or ill-treatment of prisoners of war or persons on the Seas, killing of hostages, plunder of public or private property, wanton destruction of cities, towns, or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity.
(c) Crimes against humanity: Murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and other inhumane acts done against any civilian population, or persecutions on political, racial, or religious grounds, when such acts are done or such persecutions are carried on in execution of or in connection with any crime against peace or any war crime."
Principle VII "Complicity in the commission of a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity as set forth in Principle VI is a crime under international law."

Article explaining that the Westfields escaped Nazi Germany as refugees in 1940 while Walter Westfield, the famous art dealer was murdered at Auschwitz  here

More details from Bloomberg on the Westfield case here

Washington Post on the Westfield case here 

Fred Westfield's lawsuit was supposed to have been touched off by an inquiry from the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.   I can't find any information about the Westfield work on the MFA's website.

According to its website (excerpt below), the MFA Boston can't figure out where approximately 50% of its artworks come from that fit into the class of works that could have been looted by the Nazis.   MFA has compiled a "priority list" and claims it is researching its collection, but it appears to keep the research secret and inaccessable.

To avoid scrutiny into the provenance of one painting, MFA sued heirs of Holocaust victims recently over Kokoschka's Two Nudes - Lovers.  More information on that case here   The First Circuit's decision in Museum of Fine Arts, Boston v. Seger Thomschitz here.   Unfortunately, the MFA won the case on statute of limitations grounds, ensuring that an artwork which appears to have been taken from the Viennese Jew Oskar Reichel under the Nazis and given to a dealer with Nazi connections in February 1939 will remain in the MFA's hands.   To my knowledge, the MFA has not published its provenance research on the Kokoschka, but simply puts propagandistic conclusory language on its website, such as:

 "In February 1939, Reichel transferred ownership of five Kokoschka paintings—including Two Nudes (Lovers) —to Kallir, who exhibited them in his Paris gallery that spring."

More such unverifiable propaganda here    This passive language is what we lawyers call "conclusory".  When people use such language, we usually demand FACTS from which we may draw accurate conclusions.    How did this "ownership transfer" occur?   I would like to know more.

The First Circuit's decision tells us enough to conclude that the Kokoschka was stolen from Reichel:

Pursuant to Nazi regulations, Dr. Reichel was forced to file a declaration in June 1938 listing all of the valuable property he owned. One expert witness described the declaration as a "prelude to the formal Nazi confiscation and seizure of all Jewish-owned property in Austria and Germany." Proceeds from the sale of declared property had to be deposited into a Nazi-controlled account and could be withdrawn only in limited amounts. In his 1938 property declaration, Dr. Reichel stated that he owned the Painting and four other Kokoschka works. He declared the combined value of the Painting and another work to be 250 Reichsmark.

[....] While Kallir was in Paris, Dr. Reichel agreed to transfer his remaining five Kokoschka works, including the Painting, to Kallir. The details of this transaction are sketchy. It is not clear whether Dr. Reichel received any consideration for the works at the time.

How did Oskar Reichel "transfer ownership" when his assets are completely blocked by the Nazis, he did't get paid, and the Nazis have a gun to his head and have already put his assets in their 1939 war budget?

We all know that Adolph Eichmann arrived in Vienna in the summer of 1938 and set up his infamous "conveyor belt" at the Zentralstelle - a Jew arrived and left with a passport completely despoiled of property.  The April 26, 1938 law forbid Jews with more than 5,000 RM in property from making transfers of declared property without Nazi permission.  In November 1938, the Reich's beancounters at the Finance Ministry already had ALL declared Jewish property in their budget.  Even the New York Times is starting to finally report on the Reich Finance Ministry's activities, see this December 2010 article claiming that 30% of the Wehrmacht was financed by confiscated Jewish assets.   In December 1938 following Kristallnacht, Aryan trustees were appointed to act as guardians of the property for Jews and put in charge of liquidating Jewish property for the Reich.

Oskar Reichel could not have "transferred ownership" to a Kokoschka in February 1939 as a matter of law.

So the MFA's website consists of pure fiction and Holocaust denial, as far as I can tell.   But just ask Malcolm Rogers. 

Malcolm Rogers - Waving the Baton for 50% Ignorance of Provenance European Paintings and Sculptures at MFA Boston

Rather than referring to the European artworks potentially looted by Nazis as "potentially stolen from murdered Jews" the MFA Boston refers to these works as "Art with a Past".

What art doesn't have a past?

Unfortunately, in the United States, the field of art history is largely a sham - and the lack of academic attention to provenance is endemic. If a Picasso, a Pisarro or an El Greco was looted from a Jew, U.S. art historians generally don't know and don't care -- and resent any inquiry from families of the murder victims.  How could three generations of art historians permit U.S. museums to collect so much art without knowing where it comes from? These are vast quantities of artworks, not a few accidents. At all relevant times, receiving and concealing stolen property has been a crime. But unfortunately, no U.S.prosecutor has had the gumption, the evidence and the fortitude to confront this stolen art laundering establishment. The criminals in the museum community concealing the stolen art are now claiming a "fiduciary duty" to keep the stolen art in their collections.

The College Art Association was warned by the U.S. State Department not to purchase artworks coming from Europe without checking the provenance in the early 1950's.  The Roberts Commission warned America in 1946 of the same problem.

Although the MFA claims it has engaged in "intensive research" since 2004, to my knowledge, it has published none of this research including its provenance researcher's report on the Kokoscha "Two Nudes - Lovers".

The fact that the MFA can get away with this without any public furor means that there is not one art historian in Boston doing his or her job.


From the MFA website:

Nazi Era Provenance Research

The Museum of Fine Arts’ collection contains approximately 1,600 European paintings and 21,000 works of sculpture and decorative art. Since early 1998, a systematic review of the provenance of the collection has been ongoing, with the goal of identifying objects that may have been seized or improperly sold during the Nazi era. Eliminated from consideration are those works of art acquired by the museum before 1933 and those created after 1945.

About half the European paintings have histories of ownership that preclude their transfer in Europe during the period in question—many, for instance, belonged to families in Boston in the late nineteenth century and came directly to the MFA from those families. But many other paintings have histories of ownership that contain very little detail or have gaps during the years 1933-1945. These objects are the subject of further research by the museum.
Intensive research on the sculpture and decorative arts collection was begun in 2004. The online records are currently undergoing further research. As additional information comes to light, it will be added to the online collections database.
There are many reasons for gaps in provenance, ranging from a past owner’s desire for anonymity to an absence of records of transactions. Resolving provenance gaps for the period in question may be further complicated by the fact that records have been lost or destroyed. Although it is probable that most of the objects with gaps do not have problematic pasts, efforts are underway to obtain more information about them.
List of Works
The objects featured on the list of works have been identified by the MFA as priorities for further research. They changed hands in Europe between 1933 and 1945, and are associated with individuals who may have lost property as the result of Nazi persecution. Each object has undergone careful examination by our curators and still has unresolved questions regarding its history.
The inclusion of a work of art on this list does not in any way demonstrate that it was looted or improperly acquired. The list will be updated as further information becomes available.

I tried to access the "List of Works" link, but was unable to connect with anything.   How many people are working in this "systematic" effort?  What is their budget?  How much is the MFA spending suing the heirs of Holocaust victims instead of researching its collection, returning stolen artworks and apologizing to their victims?

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