[MSN] Germany opening new office to help identify and research art stolen by Nazis

[Museum Security Network Mailing list]

Germany opening new office to help identify and research art stolen by Nazis
The Associated Press
Wednesday, November 14, 2007

BERLIN: A new office within Germany's Institute for Museum Research is 
opening in January to help identify and research art stolen by the 
Nazis, Germany's culture minister said Wednesday.

The office, which comes under the State Museums of Berlin, will help 
museums, libraries and archives identify items that were taken from 
their rightful owners during the Nazi period, Culture Minister Bernd 
Neumann said.

"I expect from this an important push in Germany in the clarifying of 
restitution questions," he said.

Neumann founded a working group to look into how to deal with 
restitution issues, after Berlin sparked controversy with a decision 
last year to return Ernst Ludwig Kirchner's "Berlin Street Scene" to the 
heirs of a Jewish collector who said the Nazis forced the family to sell 
it in the 1930s.

Some art experts contested that the expressionist work was sold under 
duress and whether its return was legal.

With the new office, which has a €1 million (US$1.47 million) yearly 
budget, Neumann said he hoped the restitution process would be better 
coordinated and more transparent.

http://www.iht.com