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Jonathan Petropoulos on the Lost Museum: the Nazi Hector Feliciano. The Lost Museum: The Nazi Conspiracy to Steal the World's Greatest Works of Art. New York: Basic Books, 1997. ix + 278 pp. $27.50, cloth, ISBN 978-0-465-04194-7. Reviewed by Jonathan Petropoulos Published on H-German (March, 1998) Although there is a burgeoning literature on he looks at the fate of the art works belonging to the looting of art works by the Nazi leaders dur‐ the Rothschilds, the dealer Paul Rosenberg, the ing World War II, much of the history has yet to Bernheim-Jeune gallery, the David-Weills, and the be written because of the secretive nature of the Schloss family. Feliciano even narrows the focus art world and the sheer number of works that at times to specific works of art, such as the chap‐ were displaced. In this trade book intended for a ter devoted to Jan Vermeer's The Astronomer, broad audience (a revised version of a 1995 which was seized from Baron Alphonse de Roth‐ French book Le Musee Disparu), Paris-based jour‐ schild by the Nazi looting agency the Einsatzstab nalist Hector Feliciano has published the results Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR) and passed on to of seven years of investigation. Although this Hitler. Such detailed study is often very illuminat‐ work tells us little that is new about the Germans' ing, as he cites, for example, the letter Alfred behavior, it offers a vivid portrait of the art world Rosenberg sent to Martin Bormann in November in occupied France and gives insight into the of‐ 1940 just before transporting the painting to Ger‐ ten problematic treatment of looted art works by many. Rosenberg noted, "I am pleased moreover museum officials and collectors in the postwar pe‐ to inform the Fuehrer that the painting by Jan Ver riod. This latter topic in particular has made news Meer of Delft [sic], to which he made mention, has in both Europe and North America. been found among the works confiscated from Feliciano's scope of study is intentionally de‐ the Rothschilds" (p. 15). This correspondence, limited: in the frst of the three sections which fol‐ then, suggests Hitler's active participation in the low the introduction, he examines fve private looting program and offers further evidence of collections in France, which he notes was the Rosenberg's circumscribed intellectual horizons. "most looted country in Western Europe," with Feliciano's decision to focus on a limited num‐ "one-third of all the art in private hands ... [having ber of collections enables him to include details been] pillaged by the Nazis" (p. 4). More narrowly, which make this history not only specific but H-Net Reviews vivid. He provides the precise addresses of the "good faith" and possessed it for fve years. The se‐ three branches of the Rothschild family in Paris; crecy clauses of the banking laws and the preva‐ and by including photos of the interiors of certain lent use of the diplomatic pouch also contributed of the homes--for example, that of Edouard, who to the trafficking in stolen art works. Feliciano directed the bank and lived in Talleyrand's resi‐ confirms what other scholars had previously ar‐ dence near the Place de la Concorde--one gains a gued: a large number of dealers in occupied West‐ sense of the ambience that prevailed until 1939. ern Europe and neutral Switzerland colluded with These art works, which were used instrumentally the Nazi elite as the latter amassed sizeable collec‐ by the Nazi leaders to help overcome insecurities tions. about their social status, usually stemmed from The fnal section of the book concerns the opulent, quasi-regal milieux. The history of these search for displaced and missing art works. This residences alone speaks volumes. Feliciano tells of information is where Feliciano has made a name the head butler of Robert de Rothschild who cre‐ for himself as he revealed that the Musee Nation‐ ated a secret room near the laundry, flled it with al d'Art Moderne in Paris was among the institu‐ valuable art works and antiques, and then had it tions in France and Switzerland that held works sealed off and the wall whitewashed. Despite the that had been seized from Jewish victims during fact that Goering's chief of staff General von the war by the Germans (these works are now re‐ Hanesse commandeered the palace, the treasures ferred to as Musees Nationaux Recuperation or were never discovered. Feliciano's extensive MNRs). Feliciano exposed the code utilized by the knowledge of Paris serves him well in bringing museum to keep track of the provenance of the this history to light. works in the collection: "R" referred for "recuper‐ The second section of the volume concerns ation" and the number following it signified the the art market in Paris and Switzerland during order in which the work arrived at the museum. the war. The Paris market, as Feliciano rightly Feliciano charged the museum's curators with notes, fourished after the German invasion, having "made no huge effort" to fnd the rightful when people sought out inflation-proof assets and owners for "thousands of unclaimed works" (p. had limited opportunities to spend their money. 215). According to the Ministry of Culture, 61,000 He quotes Alfred Daber, who recalled "People had works were returned to France after the war and plenty of cash, but there were no pretty clothes, 45,000, or approximately 80 percent, were re‐ no new cars, no vacations, and no restaurants and turned to the proper owners (p. 216). Of those cabarets in which to spend money. All you could which went unclaimed, some two thousand of the do was buy butter on the black market" (p. 123). most important works went into the national mu‐ But of course, there was always art. Feliciano de‐ seums, while the remainder were auctioned off. scribes this "frenzied" atmosphere, and also ex‐ Feliciano worked assiduously for four years at‐ plains how the Swiss market evolved into "a kind tempting to locate the archival records pertaining of satellite to the French market" (p. 154). He to two thousand works, and although he was de‐ rightly observes that "this neutral nation enabled nied access to the papers kept by French Ministry buyers of art to transport and dispose of it, be‐ of Foreign Affairs, he was able to piece together coming a sort of plundered art gallery" (p. 154). some of the history through the general catalogs He explains not only how the Swiss political cul‐ of the major institutions like the Louvre and the ture, but also how the legal system proved con‐ Musee d'Orsay. Oftentimes, Feliciano is able only ducive to the laundering of looted art: an acquisi‐ to raise questions, as in the case of a Boucher's tion was (and still is) deemed legal and perma‐ painting now in the Louvre which was sold at nent if the person purchasing the work did so in auction in 1941 to an unknown buyer. It was not 2 H-Net Reviews possible to discern the rightful owner and the cru‐ pied Zone). Feliciano is also not immune to some cial fle in the French public archives was suspi‐ larger conceptual problems. For example, he ciously missing (p. 227). treats Hitler's collection as a private one (p. 15); Hector Feliciano's research, however, has also while one may make this argument, Hitler consid‐ yielded tangible results. The Administration of the ered it an official or public collection and one French National Museums admitted to having should allude to the complexities of the situation. come up short in the search for rightful owners The book is also not systematic in terms of geo‐ and took steps to remedy this, including a web graphic scope (Poland, for example is scarcely page and an exhibition of many MNRs in spring mentioned), or the range of plundering organiza‐ 1997. Around this time, then French Prime Minis‐ tions (e.g., there is no mention of the very impor‐ ter Alain Juppe promised to create a commission tant Sonderkommando Kuensberg which ravaged to investigate Jewish assets held by the govern‐ the Eastern Front). Feliciano's tone is also occa‐ ment since the war (p. 236). The investigation that sionally self-aggrandizing. He uses formulations was largely prompted by Feliciano's book led to such as "the second official exchange of which I somewhat greater openness on the part of French am aware" (p. 158), when in fact, he is summariz‐ authorities: the heirs to collector Alphonse Kann, ing British intelligence officer Douglas Cooper's for example, were given a dossier by the Foreign 1945 report that carefully documents the twenty- Ministry which helped them in their attempt to eight exchanges. He asserts in the introduction recover certain works (some now in the hands of that "no one...had tried putting side by side and private parties in the United States). But one meticulously analyzing these long-compartmen‐ should not be too sanguine about this story: Feli‐ talized and heterogeneous elements: wartime ciano was denied access to crucial documents by books and memoirs; classified and declassified the French government, was attacked by French documents and interrogation reports coming officials in the press and in scholarly colloquia, from France, Germany, Switzerland, the U.K., the and has more generally "touched a raw nerve in former Soviet Union, and the United States; peri‐ French society" (p. 236). This book shows what od photographs; art history and museum docu‐ most have long known: for the French, the occu‐ ments..." (p. 6). This claim is not only immodest pation years are still a troubling chapter of their and wrong (other scholars have undertaken simi‐ history that they have yet to master.
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