For immediate release:

NATHAN HEIRS WITHDRAW APPEALS OF STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS RULING AND CHALLENGE MUSEUMS TO SUBMIT CLAIMS TO ARBITRATION ON THE MERITS

(New York, New York, May 10, 2007) Reacting to two court decisions in Ohio and Michigan finding that the local three year statute of limitations in both states barred their claims for the return of two paintings (a Gauguin and a Van Gogh) lost in the Nazi era in Germany, the Martha Nathan heirs today withdrew their appeal of the decisions and challenged the museums involved to submit the claims to binding arbitration on the merits of the claims.
 
From the outset of the lawsuits filed by the museums, the Nathan heirs contended that their claims were based on the principles of the Washington Conference on Holocaust era assets and included the moral obligation to return Holocaust era art which was lost in the Nazi era due to Nazi persecution. Martha Nathan was a German Jew who was forced to flee Germany after the Nazis forced the "aryanization" of her family's bank, the Dreyfus Bank in Frankfurt am Main. In the years from 1937 and 1938 she was forced to sell the properties belonging to her parents, her villa in the Mendelsohn Str. in Frankfurt, and to pay a large discriminatory exit tax. In the course of these sales, 4 paintings believed to have been smuggled to Switzerland, were also transferred to a consortium of three art dealers, two of whom were German. Sales documents from Wildenstein, New York, indicated that the paintings came from the collection of Martha Nathan Frankfurt and that they were initially obtained by the "Galerie Thannhauser, Berlin" on or about December 14, 1938, a few weeks after "Reichskristallnacht," the night of the broken glass, when Nazis rioted against Jewish property owners. No matter where the paintings were actually located at the time of their loss, the Wildenstein sales documents clearly indicate that the paintings belonged to the Jewish collection of Martha Nathan based in Frankfurt, Germany, and were obtained by the Galerie Thannhauser, Berlin, Germany, in December 1938, just after the Nazi riots.  The Toledo Museum of Arts (TMA) also confirmed this information on their website when they listed the Nazi era provenance of the Gauguin painting “Street in Tahiti” as coming from the Martha Nathan collection in Frankfurt, with the next owner listed as the Galerie Thannhauser, Berlin (see Wildenstein sales documentation and TMA website listing attached).
           
In opposing the Martha Nathan heirs claims, the museums involved, the Toledo Museum of Arts (TMA) and Detroit Institute of Art (DIA) met with the Martha Nathan heirs in early 2006 to discuss the claims and then filed suit against them on the very same day in order to assert that Ohio and Michigan law barred such claims because they were more than three years old. Presumably, suit was filed in both states to take advantage of the favorable three year statute of limitations. California law, where one of the Nathan heirs lives, permits such suits until the year 2010. Thus, by ambushing the Nathan heirs with a lawsuit involving their mostly morally based claims, the museums hoped to avoid the substantive issue as to whether or not the paintings were lost due to Nazi persecution, and gain the advantage of a local court ruling which in effect says that no Holocaust era claims may be brought in Ohio and Michigan because their local legislatures have not yet passed legislation which would permit an exception to the local three year statute of limitations in order to permit Holocaust era claims.

The preemptory lawsuits brought by the museums, however, do not address the substance of the Martha Nathan heirs claims that Martha Nathan was under duress from Nazi persecution when the paintings were obtained for far less than their fair market value by the art dealers. The museums sought to distinguish the Martha Nathan claims from other Nazi era claims by asserting that, despite the fact that she lost almost all of her property due to Nazi persecution, she lead a “grand life” and was safe from the Nazis because she obtained French citizenship after leaving Germany. However, in fact Nazi persecution began against her in Germany and then followed her to France where the belongings which she was able to salvage from Germany were also looted by the Nazis when they invaded and occupied France. Therefore, Nazi persecution against Martha Nathan did not cease when she left Germany or when she became French, but continued throughout the entire Nazi period until the end of WWII. In addition, the Wildenstein documentation clearly states that the paintings belonged to the Martha Nathan collection in Frankfurt and were obtained by the Galerie Thannhauser, Berlin, in December 1938, thus clearing indicating a loss in Nazi Germany in 1938, the same year in which Martha Nathan’s other losses in Nazi Germany occurred.       

The assertion of a local three year statute of limitations is no answer to the principles of the Washington Conference which require a "just and fair" solution to Nazi era claims. To assert that one is in compliance with the Washington Conference and the related principles of the AAM and AAMD, and at the same time to assert a three year statute of limitations which prohibits Nazi era claims, is hypocritical, and fails the test of a "just and fair" solution to such claims as mandated by the Washington Conference. The Nathan heirs believe that the museums involved are not capable of reaching a fair and just solution on their own, because they have a vested interest in the matter, and that only a neutral third party can legitimately resolve the matter. However, such a resolution, must be on the merits of the claim and cannot be based the simple assertion of a three year statute of limitations which, in effect, bars all Nazi era claims.
    
The Martha Nathan heirs now call upon TMA and DIA to comply with the principles of the Washington Conference and agree to have the Martha Nathan claims be heard by a neutral third party, such as a duly constituted art commission or neutral arbitrator, without the assertion of the local three year statute of limitations or any other similar technical defense. Only an adjudication of the matter on the merits can bring a legitimate “fair and just” resolution as mandated by the Washington Conference.              
               
David J. Rowland, Esq.        RA Peter Schink
Rowland & Associates            Schink & Studzinski


For further information contact:

David J. Rowland, Esq.
Rowland & Associates
Two Park Ave., 19th Floor
New York, New York  10016

Tel. 212-685-5509
Fax  212-685-8862

Email: This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it
Website: www.rowlandlaw.com
 
Or in Europe contact:

RA Peter Schink
Schink & Studzinski
Ostseestr. 109
10409 Berlin
Germany

Tel. 011-49-30-42851177
Fax  011-49-30-42851178

Website: www.schink-studzinski.de