The owner of a New York gallery is being sued before a French court for having bought an old master painting stolen from a Jewish collector by the Nazis during World War Two. Adam Williams, owner of the Newhouse Galleries, has been accused of receiving Frans Hals' portrait of Reverend Adrianus Tegularius, stolen by the Gestapo in the château of Chambon, South West France, in 1943 and which reappeared on the art market during the 1960's at Sotheby's in New York and later at Christie's where the American dealer bought it in 1989.
The Nazis had been frantically searching for the collection of Jewish collector Henri Schloss and finally found it in this medieval castle after being tipped-off by a French collaborationist dealer.
After the war, Henri Schloss and his wife (they died in 1964 and 1974 respectively), who had hidden their magnificent collection of old master paintings in that castle in 1939, only recovered 148 paintings out of 333 stolen by the Nazis and their heirs, represented by Jean Demartini tried effortlessly to find out what had become of the missing pictures.
After buying the Frans Hals' portrait Mr Williams exhibited it a year later at the Paris Biennial where it was impounded by French police.
On receiving charges of being in possession of a work of art that had belonged to a Jewish family, Mr Williams defended himself by saying that he ignored the fraudulent provenance of the painting. All the more there had been no mention of provenance in the Christie's sale catalogue.
In 1996, a French court decided not to prosecute the dealer but its decision was quashed on appeal. Now another court has to decide whether Mr Williams had bought the painting in good faith.
According to French laws there is no prescription for all works of art stolen by the Nazis during the war and several museums have been asked in recent years to hand back all Jewish-owned works of art to their owners or heirs.
Mr William's counsels retorted that his case was surely not a good example to choose regarding a debate on the spoliation of Jewish-owned works of art by the Nazis since he was not guilty of any crime. All the more, all the dealers who bought or sold such works and against whom complaints were filed have not been prosecuted so far.
Adrian Darmon
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