(Newser)
– Nora Stiasny, an Austrian Jew, inherited that of Gustav Klimt Rosiers sous les Arbres of her uncle, but was forced by the Nazis to sell it in 1938 for much less than its value. She ended up being deported to a concentration camp in Poland, where she died in 1942. But now, the Austrian artist’s painting (Rose bushes under the trees) will be returned to your family, reports the BBC. France bought the work in 1980 for the Musée d’Orsay without knowing its history, but since then it has been looted. French Culture Minister Roselyne Bachelot says the only option was to return it to its rightful owners.
“The decision we make is obviously difficult. It results in the removal of a masterpiece from the national collections, which is the only painting by Gustav Klimt owned by France, ”she says. “But this decision is necessary, essential. Eighty-three years after the forced sale of this painting by Nora Stiasny, this is the realization of an act of justice.” France24 reports that the interim owner of the painting was a Nazi sympathizer and art dealer who died in the 1960s; The Canadian says the artist Philipp Häusler, a member of the Nazi party, bought Stiasny’s painting. (The Nazis ransacked this Klimt painting, it was also returned and later sold for $ 40.4 million.)