PARIS: 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 World War II.
The Paris museum opened two showrooms last month 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,” Sebastien Allard, the head of the paintings department at the Louvre, told The Associated Press in an interview on Tuesday.
“The large majority of the retrieved artworks have been plundered from Jewish families during World War II. 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 Lizon.”
Other more famous looted works had already been on display in the museum, but visitors did not necessarily know they had been stolen by the Nazis. In museums, pieces of art retrieved by the French authorities are identified with the label “MNR,” French initials for National Museums Recovery.
“We needed to draw attention further to the matter and raise public awareness,” said Allard. “We thought it was important to highlight the specific case of these works, which are not listed on our inventories.”
The Louvre initiative is the latest effort by French authorities to find heirs of families who lost their artwork. A working group set up by the Culture Ministry is in charge of tracing back the origins of the art and identifying owners. But it’s a long and laborious task: only some 50 pieces have been returned since 1951.
“People who come forward need, for instance, to establish the proof that the artwork belonged to their grandfather,” Allard said. “They need to find old family pictures and payment slips, or gather testimonies. It can take years.”
In addition to the display of art in several museums across the country, French authorities have also designed an MNR catalog , which is available online and can help owners identify their items without traveling to the Louvre. The complete list is known under the name of Rose Valland, a French curator who risked her life keeping notes on all the art the Nazis stole during the war.
Louvre displays art looted by Nazis, hopes to find owners
Louvre displays art looted by Nazis, hopes to find owners
Berlinale responds to backlash over Gaza-related comments
The Berlin International Film Festival has issued a statement after what organisers described as a growing “media storm” linked to comments about the war in Gaza and the broader role of politics in cinema.
Festival director Tricia Tuttle released a lengthy note late Saturday following criticism directed at several high-profile guests. The controversy began during the opening day press conference when jury president Wim Wenders was asked about the conflict in Gaza. He responded: “We have to stay out of politics because if we make movies that are dedicatedly political, we enter the field of politics,” a remark that sparked swift backlash online.
Indian author Arundhati Roy later withdrew from the festival, reportedly angered by the remarks.
Other prominent figures, including Michelle Yeoh and Neil Patrick Harris, also faced online criticism after responding cautiously to questions about politics. Harris stated that he was interested in “doing things that were ‘apolitical,’” a comment that further fuelled debate.
In her statement, Tuttle defended the festival and its participants, stressing the importance of artistic freedom. “People have called for free speech at the Berlinale. Free speech is happening at the Berlinale. But increasingly, filmmakers are expected to answer any question put to them. They are criticised if they do not answer. They are criticised if they answer and we do not like what they say. They are criticised if they cannot compress complex thoughts into a brief sound bite when a microphone is placed in front of them when they thought they were speaking about something else,” she said.
She added: “It is hard to see the Berlinale and so many hundreds of filmmakers and people who work on this festival distilled into something we do not always recognise in the online and media discourse… It is a large, complex festival.”
“Artists are free to exercise their right of free speech in whatever way they choose… nor should they be expected to speak on every political issue raised to them unless they want to,” Tuttle said.
