A landscape artwork of Claude Monet was discovered in the suitcase of Adolf Hitler’s art dealer’s son, Cornelius Gurlitt, which he took with him while staying in a hospital for treatment in the southern Germany, reports said. Gurlitt died in May of this year at his home.
It remains unclear to the team of art historians, who were instructed to investigate the nature of acquisition, why the artwork was even left at the hospital. The art historians were tasked to find out if the recovered artwork in the hospital was one of those stolen in the World War Two by the Nazis.
Said artwork was then sent back to the administrators of Gurlitt’s estate. It is said to be the most recent piece found from the late German art collector’s long-hidden trove.
The discovery came after a number of artworks were previously discovered in Gurlitt’s flat in Munich sometime in 2012, in the midst of a tax evasion investigation. His art collection was, however, only revealed to public November last year.
Such discovery has given authorities the idea of having missed sequestering many artworks from Munich’s apartment.
While the said squad of art historians has seen the artwork’s photos, they have not assessed it yet in person.
Reports said the landscape artwork, depicting a beach at Sainte-Adresse, seems to have been made sometime in 1864.
In April, Gurlitt agreed with the German and Bavarian governments to return to the families of original owners everything looted by the Nazis in his collection.
He left a will stating that all artworks he collected that the task force didn’t take are to be given to the Kunstmuseum in Switzerland. The museum—sole heir to the art collection—hasn’t decided yet but has the end of this year to decide whether to accept the collection or not.
What Gurlitt has in his collection are works by notable artists such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Max Liebermann and Otto Dix, among others. Investigators have identified two paintings as looted ones, which are Sitting Woman by Matisse and Two Riders by Liebermann.
The taskforce confirmed in June that the artwork by Matisse belonged lawfully to the Paul Rosenberg, a French art dealer. Then In August, they again declared that the Lieberman artwork belonged to the late Jewish collector David Toren’s descendant.
These paintings weren’t given back to its original owners yet. Seven other paintings in Gurlitt’s collection are being suspected as looted artworks.
