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The contention about a famous work by Picasso seems to have been settled, although in a reserved and rather mysterious way: it will remain property of the Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation.
The news that the ownership of the disputed Picasso has been sanctioned was revealed a few days ago. The fascinating painting dated from 1903, realised during the so-called blue period and entitled The absinth drinker, is the protagonist of a long episode which started during the Nazi period and has been revived in the last 4 years. It all started in the Thirties when the Jewish banker Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, according to what his heirs now claim, was forced by the Nazis to sell the painting, losing trace of it. In 1995 Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, great prize-winning composer of successful musicals, such as Jesus Christ Superstar and Cats, bought the prestigious piece for 23 million euros.
The Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation, wanted by the great composer in 1992 to divulge the knowledge of arts, has often lent the sought-after piece to galleries and museums for prestigious exhibitions. This factor, added to the trends of the art market, has contributed to increasing the value of the work which is now estimated at more than 30 million pounds (that is more than 34 million euros).
The turning-point happened in November 2006, when the above-mentioned foundation decided to sell the work at a New York auction, but was forced to withdraw it because it was suddenly reclaimed by the descendants of Paolo Mendelssohn Bartholdy. The polemic was raised, in the name of the entire Mendelssohn family, by Julius Schoeps, great-grandson of the Jewish banker and director of the Institute Moses-Mendelssohn of Potsdam, who pointed out how the painting was not voluntarily given up, but sold between 1934 and 1935 to a merchant from Berlin under the economic and political pressure of the Nazi regime. Therefore this was enough for the family, descendant of the very famous German composer, to lay claim to the legal ownership of the “stolen” painting and stop its trading.
In the last days, in Washington, a lawyer claimed that an agreement has been reached between the parties, according to which the Lord Lloyd Webber foundation will keep the ownership of the Picasso. Both parties expressed to the British newspaper “The Independent” their wish to keep the details of the agreement reserved and they refused to confirm the hypothesis that the Webber foundation may have convinced Mr Mendelssohn’s heirs to give up the work for a handsome recompense. After the negotiations were ended, the Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation quickly stated: “The administrators are glad to announce that professor Schoeps and all the other heirs of Paul Mendelssohn Bartholdy have decided to give up any claim on the painting The absinth drinker. However, a last-minute waiver by the Mendelssohn family, after so much insistence and years of legal battles, can raise suspicion about such a confidential situation, in which it cannot be ruled out that money provided the solution.
It is a well-known fact that the German family is used to advantageous agreements “for the love of art”: last February the heirs settled another transaction in New York, with both the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Foundation, for other two Picassos believed to belong to the family’s lost collection. In that case the judge did not appreciate the secrecy of the negotiations because, while the two museums – in transparency – had no problems to divulge the amounts given for the two works, the descendants of Mendelssohn Bartholdy had objected to this decision with a number of unaccountable reasons, perhaps to keep hidden the value of the loot pocketed.
Not only. At this point we wonder, with regard to the episode of the Absinth drinker, how come the German heirs reclaimed its ownership only a short time ago, seventy years after it had gone lost and only after the painting had had at least four owners, therefore after being put on the market several times before 2006.
At the moment the Webber foundation, which has stated to be very upset about not being able to sell or display the portrait due to this legal action, has not made a decision yet about whether it may be put up for auction. Now the portrait of the green fairy drinker, who has been identified as Angel Fernandez de Soto – one of the artist’s close friends, has an owner but it is only one of the thousands of works of Jewish families, forcedly sold or stolen during the Third Reich, which are reclaimed or lie forgotten somewhere. Indeed, today we know about 20,000 works of art that were stolen under that regime and are now lost.
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