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Paris Musee d’Orsay Opens Gallery for Nazi-Looted Artworks
The Musee d’Orsay has opened a new gallery displaying 13 works known as MNR artworks that were looted by the Nazis and have no identified owners. The display allows visitors to view the reverse sides of the paintings showing stamps and labels from their wartime history. The museum also launched a six-person Franco-German research unit last month to trace potential heirs.
May 6, 3:55 AM·2m read1 source
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A painting by Belgian artist Alfred Stevens from 1891 is among the 13 works now on display. The artwork shows a girl in a bonnet and her younger brother looking toward the Normandy coast. It was acquired in Paris in 1942 for Adolf Hitler and later intended for his planned museum in Linz, Austria, before being moved to his Bavarian retreat.
Allied teams known as the Monuments Men recovered the painting after the war. No heir has come forward and its ownership before 1942 is unknown. The gallery is the first in the museum’s history to focus on these orphaned masterpieces. Visitors can examine the reverse sides of the displayed paintings.
These reveal stamps, labels and inventory marks that document their path from private homes into Nazi possession. They are not state property but are kept for possible return to heirs. France recovered about 60,000 of roughly 100,000 cultural objects looted during the occupation, returning 45,000 to owners.
The 2,200 MNR artworks were those without identified owners from the remaining 15,000 pieces.
Last month the museum established its first research unit dedicated to the works. The unit consists of six Franco-German researchers who will examine files to identify rightful owners. Returns of such artworks have been limited over the decades. Only four MNR works were returned between 1954 and 1993.
The museum has returned 15 pieces since 1994. Recent returns in 2024 included works by Alfred Sisley and Auguste Renoir to heirs of one family. Other paintings in the gallery include an Edward Degas copy of a Berlin ballroom scene once owned by a Jewish collector killed in Auschwitz.
