A Painting Stolen by the Nazis Discovered in Argentina (6 photos)

During World War II, the Nazis stole the painting from a Jewish art dealer. It recently appeared in a real estate ad in Argentina.





"Portrait of a Lady," painted by the Italian artist Vittore Ghislandi in 1743, adorned the wall above the sofa in an ad for the Robles Casas & Campos agency.

Art experts have concluded that the painting is authentic, according to the Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad. In recent years, similar works by Gislandi have fetched only a few thousand dollars or less at auction.



"There is no reason to believe it is a copy," noted Annalies Cool and Perry Schreyer of the Dutch Heritage Agency. They added that definitive proof could be found on the back of the painting, where notes or inscriptions confirming its authenticity and provenance may have been preserved.

"Portrait of a Lady" belonged to Jacques Goudstikker, a successful art dealer from Amsterdam who helped his compatriots escape the Nazis and died at sea while attempting to cross the English Channel on a cargo ship bound for Great Britain.

At least 800 works of art belonging to Goudstikker were seized or purchased under Nazi pressure. These lost works are classified as stolen.

Portrait of Countess Colleoni

In the early 2000s, investigators recovered more than 200 paintings, but many of them disappeared. For example, "Portrait of a Lady" was added to the international list of lost masterpieces.

An investigation into how the portrait ended up in an Argentine home led AD reporters to Friedrich Cadgien. He was a financial advisor to high-ranking Nazi official Hermann Göring. He was tasked with funding the Nazi war effort, often by stealing art and diamonds from Jewish entrepreneurs in the Netherlands.



Jacques Goudstikker

After the war, Cadgien fled to Argentina, where he died in 1979. The house listed in the ad belonged to his daughter. When reporters asked the woman about the painting, she said she was too busy to answer their questions.

Marei von Sacher, Goudstikker's heir, intends to file a lawsuit and initiate legal proceedings to return the painting to her family.

"I began searching for works of art belonging to my father-in-law, Jacques Goudstikker, in the late 1990s and I don't plan to stop," said 81-year-old von Sacher.

"My family intends to return every single piece of art stolen from Jacques's collection and restore his legacy."

She said Goudstikker kept details of his collection in a notebook. He took it with him when he left for Britain in May 1940. The notebook was found thanks to his wife, Desi, and their only son, Edo. They both survived and emigrated to the United States.



Hermann Göring in his prison cell during the Nuremberg Trials, 1945

Dutch experts from the Cultural Heritage Agency have found another missing masterpiece on the social media page of Cadgien's second daughter – a painting by Abraham Mignon, a 17th-century Dutch still life artist. However, experts have not yet been able to identify its owner.