Louvre puts art looted by Nazis on show in hope original owners’ heirs will claim them
The permanent display of 31 paintings represents a fraction of the thousands of works of art stolen by German forces in France between 1940 and 1945 and still unclaimed
The Louvre Museum is putting 31 paintings on permanent display in an effort to find the rightful owners of those and other works of art looted by Nazis during the second world war.
The Paris museum recently opened two showrooms to display the paintings, which are among thousands of works of art looted by German forces in France between 1940 and 1945.
More than 45,000 objects have been handed back to their rightful owners since the war, but more than 2,000 remain unclaimed, including 296 paintings stored at the Louvre.
“These paintings don’t belong to us. Museums often looked like predators in the past, but our goal is to return them,” says Sebastien Allard, the head of the paintings department at the Louvre.
“The large majority of the retrieved artworks were plundered from Jewish families during the second world war. Beneficiaries can see these artworks, declare that these artworks belong to them, and officially ask for their return.”
The paintings in the new showrooms are from various artists of different eras and horizons, including a remarkable landscape from Theodore Rousseau, La Source du Lison.