Bremen to restitute "Departure of St. Ursula"

The Senate of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen has approved the restitution of the painting Departure of St. Ursula from the collection of the Böttcherstrasse Museums to the rightful heirs of Munich Jewish antiquarian Jacques Rosenthal. Rosenthal was forced to sell his business, home and art collection under pressure of persecution in January 1936. Ludwig Roselius later acquired the painting at the first auction held at the Adolf Weinmüller auction house in Munich.

The painting has been the property of the City of Bremen since 1988, when Ludwig Roselius Jr. sold the principal items from his father’s collection to the city. The Federal Republic of Germany has been a one-third co-owner since 1989. As a result of research into the Rosenthal Collection done by the Central Institute of Art History in Munich and provenance research carried out by the Böttcherstrasse Museums, it was concluded that the painting had been confiscated from Jacques Rosenthal in 1936 as a result of Nazi persecution.

In a dialogue mediated by the Holocaust Claims Processing Office between the descendants of the Rosenthal family and the Senator for Culture, with the involvement of the Böttcherstrasse Museums and the Central Institute of Art History in Munich, a just and fair solution was agreed on in accordance with the Washington Principles. The painting is to be restituted to the heirs and the museum will endeavour to buy it back. In principle, the heirs are in favour of the painting remaining in the Bremen collection, and the funds required for this purpose are now being raised. The painting will remain on loan to the Böttcherstrasse Museums until the intended repurchase takes place.

More on this subject:

Project funding Rekonstruktion der privaten Kunstsammlung von Jacques, Emma und Erwin Rosenthal [Reconstruction of the private art collection of Jacques, Emma and Erwin Rosenthal]

Blog post Memory as a mission