A painting looted by the Nazis in Holland was returned to the heirs of its Jewish owner by Rutgers University.
The 1509 work “Portrait of a Young Man” by German painter Hans Baldung Grien, was returned Jan. 14 to Simon Goodman of Los Angeles, the grandson of a Dutch banker whose extensive collection was seized by the Nazis in Holland in May 1940. The university had spent a year tracking the origins of the portrait.
The art collection of Goodman’s grandparents was well-known in prewar European art circles, according to reports.
“Portrait of a Young Man” was part of a group of seven works that the Goodmans traded to a German art dealer representing Hitler in return for safe passage out of Nazi-occupied Europe. Instead, Nazi officers looted the art and sent the owners to death camps, where they perished, according to the Associated Press.
The painting was donated by then-owner Rudolf Heinemann to Rutgers in 1959. — jta