Wall Street Journal July 9, 1999

Austria's Timid 'Conscience'

In Jason Edward Kaufman's "The Rothschild Affair: A Test of Austria's Conscience" (Leisure & Arts, July 6), the author suggests that Austria's sincerity in making restitution for past crimes will be tested by future cases. If so, the jury may already be in. On June 28, the federal government accepted the recommendation of its advisory board against restitution of five important paintings by Gustav Klimt that had been stolen from the collection of Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer during World War II.

The advisory board met in secret and would not permit the heirs to participate or respond to the opponents of restitution. The chairman of the advisory board and his compatriot in the attorney general's office refused to share with the other members two legal opinions from an Austrian lawyer supporting the heirs' claims to the Klimt paintings.

Important documents supporting the heirs' case were also withheld from the other members of the advisory board. Not surprisingly, given the value of the paintings involved and the lack of any fair procedures, the advisory board voted against restitution.

Minister Elisabeth Gehrer, who proposed the new legislation directing the return of looted art from Austrian federal museums, immediately accepted her advisory board's recommendation. Since then, she has been quoted extensively in the papers making the absurd claim that the paintings were not stolen during the war, nor restituted and made subject to export restrictions (conditions that do not appear in the new law).

The undisputed facts are as follows: Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer fled Austria in March 1938 and his entire estate was confiscated and liquidated to pay illegal taxes levied by the Nazis. In his second-to-last will, dated Oct. 8, 1942, Ferdinand wrote while in exile in Zurich: "In an illegal manner, a tax penalty of one million Reichsmarks was imposed and my entire estate in Vienna was confiscated and distributed." The Nazi lawyer appointed to liquidate Ferdinand's estate, Erich Führer, traded two Klimt paintings (Adele Bloch-Bauer I and Apfelbaum) and sold one (Adele Bloch-Bauer II) to the Austrian Gallery. He sold Birkenwald to the City of Vienna and kept Häuser in Unterach Attersee for himself.

After the war, Gustav Rinesch attempted, first on behalf of Ferdinand and then, after Ferdinand's death in November 1945, on behalf of Ferdinand's heirs, to recover the five Klimt paintings and other artworks. Häuser in Unterach am Attersee was apparently retrieved from Mr. Führer, who was imprisoned for Nazi activities, and kept in the apartment of Karl Bloch-Bauer, pending a request for export permits. The City of Vienna agreed in 1947 to return Birkenwald to Ferdinand's heirs. Only the Austrian Gallery refused to return the three paintings it had taken from Ferdinand's collection during the war, claiming instead that the paintings had been given to the Austrian Gallery in 1925 by Ferdinand's wife. This claim was inconsistent with Adele Bloch-Bauer's will of 1923, which makes the unenforceable request that her husband donate the paintings after his death.

However, Director Karl Garzarolli of the Austrian Gallery prepared to sue the heirs, and on April 2, 1948, wrote to Otto Demus of the Federal Monument Office with regard to the Klimt paintings and other artworks in Ferdinand's collection: "I ask that the acquisition and trade proposals only be made when the attorney general has given the okay; in other words, a delayed procedure is requested for tactical reasons."

Demus then telephoned and met with Rinesch, informing him that the Austrian Gallery desired a number of artworks from Ferdinand's collection, including the Klimt paintings. Based on this meeting, Rinesch decided (without first obtaining the informed consent of his clients) to agree to donate the Klimt paintings to the Austrian Gallery in order to get the absolutely necessary support of Garzarolli and Demus for export permits for the other paintings by Waldmüller, Danhauser, Pettenkofen, Rudolf von Alt, etc. Rinesch met with Garzarolli to confirm this deal on April 10, 1948--the same day he first saw Adele's will and concluded, "This is not in the form of a bequest." On April 13, Rinesch sent his five-page request for export permits for the rest of the Bloch-Bauer collection to Demus, with a copy to Garzarolli adding, "I rely on your sense of justice."

The fact that we have documents to evidence all these events is, after 50 years, amazing. The fact that the advisory board simply ignored them is even more incredible. Based on its improper handling of the matter, we do not believe the advisory board can be trusted to give an impartial recommendation, even if it is directed to consider the relevant documents and allow the heirs to participate, as the law permits. Therefore, we have proposed that a panel of neutral arbitrators be selected to review the documents and legal opinions of both sides and come to a final conclusion that everyone can live with. If the advisory board's conclusion is correct, then Austria has nothing to fear from this procedure. However, if the advisory board has misled Minister Gehrer, then justice can be done and the artworks can finally be returned to their rightful owners.

E. Randol Schoenberg Los Angeles
(Mr. Schoenberg represents the Bloch-Bauer heirs in their attempt to retrieve the Klimt paintings from Austria.)