We were privileged to file today a petition for certiorari with the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of our client, art dealer Alexander Khochinsky. The petition asks the Court for reinstatement of a lawsuit...more
11/8/2021
/ Art Dealers ,
Due Process ,
Extradition ,
Fine Art ,
First Amendment ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
International Litigation ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Petition for Writ of Certiorari ,
Poland ,
Restitution ,
Retaliatory Arrests ,
SCOTUS
Last week, on behalf of our client Alexander Khochinsky, an art dealer, we filed a petition to rehear en banc the June 18, 2021 decision by a three-judge panel affirming the dismissal of the lawsuit against Poland for lack of...more
(WASHINGTON-October 22, 2020) The heirs to the Jewish art dealers who were forced to sell the medieval devotional art collection known as the Welfenschatz (in English, the Guelph Treasure) to agents of Hermann Goering in 1935...more
10/23/2020
/ Art Collections ,
Comity ,
Expropriation ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Germany ,
Heritage & Culture ,
Jurisdiction ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Petition for Writ of Certiorari ,
Restitution ,
Sovereign Immunity ,
Takings Clause
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit yesterday affirmed the 2019 judgment that allowed the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Museum in Madrid to retain Camille Pissarro’s Rue St. Honoré, après-midi, effet de pluie (Rue...more
8/20/2020
/ Adverse Possession ,
Appellate Courts ,
Art ,
Art Collections ,
Cultural Artifacts ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Relations ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Germany ,
International Litigation ,
Museums ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Personal Property ,
Restitution ,
Spain ,
Standard of Review
(WASHINGTON-July 2, 2020) The United States Supreme Court today agreed to hear the appeal by Germany and the Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz (SPK) seeking to dismiss the restitution claim by the heirs to the so-called...more
7/2/2020
/ Comity ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Germany ,
International Litigation ,
Jurisdiction ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Restitution ,
Stolen Goods ,
War Crimes
Late Tuesday evening—the day after Memorial Day no less—the United States Office of the Solicitor General filed a brief amicus curiae in our clients’ pending case against the Federal Republic of Germany and the Stiftung...more
6/3/2020
/ FCEJCA ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Germany ,
International Litigation ,
Jurisdiction ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Restitution ,
Stolen Goods ,
War Crimes
The Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz (Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, or SPK) in Berlin announced that it had agreed to restitute a 1537 painting of the biblical figure Lot by Hans Baldung Grien to the heirs of Hans...more
1/23/2020
/ Appraisal ,
Art Collections ,
Art Dealers ,
Cultural Artifacts ,
Fair Market Value ,
Fine Art ,
Germany ,
Heirs ,
Museums ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Restitution ,
Stolen Goods
My client Alexander Khochinsky is safely back in the United States after an eight-month ordeal spurred by Poland’s retaliation for his assertion of restitution for his mother’s property lost in Poland during the Holocaust....more
10/22/2019
/ Bad Faith ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Extradition ,
Extraterritoriality Rules ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
International Litigation ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Poland ,
Popular ,
Probable Cause ,
Restitution ,
Retaliatory Arrests ,
Stolen Goods
The Appellate Division First Department in New York has affirmed the trial court’s ruling in Reif v. Nagy that the heirs of Viennese actor and Holocaust victim Franz Friedrich (Fritz) Grünbaum are entitled to the return of...more
7/12/2019
/ Appeals ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Germany ,
Good Faith ,
HEAR Act ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Paintings Sculptures and Engravings ,
Power of Attorney ,
Restitution ,
Statute of Limitations ,
Successors
Debate has peaked in the last year or so about the treatment and possible restitution of so-called colonial artifacts in Western (i.e., European and North American) museums. The conversation is important for many reasons, but...more
Alexander Khochinsky, the son of a Polish Jew who fled her home just steps ahead of the German invasion in 1941, was detained at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport yesterday. The current detention parallels Poland’s previous...more
2/27/2019
/ Bad Faith ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Extradition ,
Extraterritoriality Rules ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
International Litigation ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Poland ,
Probable Cause ,
Restitution ,
Retaliatory Arrests ,
Stolen Goods
The New York Times reported yesterday that the German Lost Art Foundation had removed several paintings once owned by the Viennese cabaret actor Fritz Grünbaum from the Lost Art database. While the history of these objects is...more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has upheld the judgment against Marei von Saher on her claims against the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena to recover Adam and Eve by Lucas Cranach the Elder. The Cranachs...more
I am pleased to be taking part in a symposium at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles on September 26, 2018, “The Future of Nazi Looted Art Recovery in the US and Abroad.” Presented by Cypress LLP and the Sotheby’s Institute of...more
(WASHINGTON-July 10, 2018) The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has affirmed the right of the heirs to the so-called Guelph Treasure (known in German as the Welfenschatz) to seek restitution in U.S. courts for the...more
(WASHINGTON, D.C.-June 27, 2018) Alexander Khochinsky, the son of a Polish Jew who fled her home just steps ahead of the German invasion in 1941, has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia...more
6/28/2018
/ Bad Faith ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Extradition ,
Extraterritoriality Rules ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
International Litigation ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Poland ,
Probable Cause ,
Restitution ,
Retaliatory Arrests ,
Stolen Goods
As Germany puts on the much-anticipated exhibition in Bonn of Cornelius Gurlitt’s disputed collection, a strange story has developed not too far away in Düsseldorf. The Stadtmuseum, which is administered by the city itself,...more
Only Sixth Work Revealed As Looted Since 2013 -
The Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste (the German Center for Cultural Property Losses) issued a press release today that an additional work from the collection of the late...more
The National Gallery London hosted on September 12, 2017 the much-anticipated conference “70 Years and Counting: the Final Opportunity?” organized by the United Kingdom Department for Digital, Culture Media & Sport (DCCS),...more
A federal appeals court has upheld the growing consensus that the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) confers jurisdiction over foreign state actors in possession of art allegedly looted by and/or overseen by the Nazis....more
6/27/2017
/ Appeals ,
Expropriation ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Heirs ,
Hungary ,
Jurisdiction ,
Museums ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Restitution ,
Sovereign Immunity ,
Stolen Goods
News Accompanied by Deafening Silence About Ongoing Restitution Policy Failures
The German government announced recently that it had returned an additional work of art found in the Salzburg home of Cornelius Gurlitt in...more
Word came this week of two resolutions of claims to Nazi-looted art in museums in New York and Cologne, and a new Nazi-looted claim against Germany filed in Washington. Barely a month after the Neue Galerie (of Austrian and...more
Two restitution related bills have advanced past the Judiciary Committee of the United States Senate: the Holocaust Expropriated Art Act (S.B. 2763, the HEAR Act), and the Foreign Cultural Exchange Jurisdictional...more
9/19/2016
/ Asset Seizure ,
Fine Art ,
Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA) ,
Foreign Sovereigns ,
HEAR Act ,
Museums ,
Nazi Looted Art ,
Proposed Legislation ,
Restitution ,
Russia ,
Stolen Goods
Works returned by Monuments Men to Bavaria for restitution to victims instead sold to Nazis’ families -
Journalists Catrin Lorch Jörg Häntzschel published this weekend an explosive revelation in Sueddeutsche Zeitung...more
We filed yesterday the opposition to the motion to dismiss my clients’ claims over the 1935 forced sale of the Guelph Treasure, or Welfenschatz. The motion was filed two months ago by defendants Germany and the Stiftung...more