Germany Opens an Official ‘Help Desk’ for Those Seeking to Reclaim Nazi-Looted Art

Germany has launched a
specialized office to help people reclaim art and other cultural
assets seized by the Nazis during WWII. The official “help desk”
has been established in Berlin by the German Lost Art Foundation,
the state-funded organization that oversees all matters pertaining
to the illegal seizure of cultural assets during the Nazi
regime.

The help desk is funded by the
German culture ministry, and the art historian Susanne Meyer-Abich
has been named as its director. She took up the position at the
beginning of January.

“Many potential restitution
cases are highly complex even with regard to content,” Germany’s
culture minister, Monika Grütters, says in a statement. The new
office, helmed by “an experienced art historian,” will help
“facilitate orientation for victims of National Socialist
persecution and their descendants, who often live abroad,” she
says. “Those who experienced unimaginable suffering at the hands of
Germans, either themselves or their ancestors, should not face
bureaucratic hurdles but be given assistance.”

The German government has often
faced criticism for dragging its heels on returning Nazi-looted art
to its Jewish owners or heirs, placing the onus on claimants to
conquer sometimes-insurmountable institutional and bureaucratic obstacles.
Billionaire art collector Ronald Lauder, the leader of the World Jewish
Congress, is among those who have accused Germany of moving too
slowly to digitize its art collections and conduct research into
their collections. “Too often, those responsible in Germany hide
behind the bureaucracy,” Lauder said during a speech at the end of
2018, according to Reuters.

Gilbert Lupfer, the academic
director on the board of the German Lost Art Foundation, says in a
statement that the foundation is “delighted” to have appointed
Susanne Meyer-Abich as a trusted point of contact in
Berlin. 

“Victims of National Socialist
looting of cultural assets and their descendants have for some time
asked for more substantial expert advice to assist with their
search for their families’ cultural assets, to identify competent
contact persons and to enable a dialogue at eye level with museums,
libraries and authorities in Germany,” Lupfer says.

Twenty-two years have passed
since the Washington Principles to return Nazi-looted art were
declared in 1998. While Germany is still leading the way in
restitution, it is estimated that one-sixth of the estimated
600,000 works that were stolen during the war are still missing,
and only a fraction of those that have been identified have been
restored to their rightful owners. According to the New York
Times, of the 44
nations that agreed to the principles, only five—the UK, the
Netherlands, Germany, France, and Austria—have established
dedicated panels to deal with them, with many other nations lagging
severely behind.

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