BRUSSELS - Fifteen parliamentary questions, five years of waiting for a Rops painting, two and a half years of no response from museums. The Nazi looting claims piled up in recent years, but nothing happened. Now it is finally in the Flemish coalition agreement. Furthermore, a painting is returning from the Tate Britain and Minister Caroline Gennez is setting up a commission to settle claims and organise provenance investigations.
Geert Sels has been investigating Nazi art from Belgium since 2014. Over 15 parliamentary questions followed, but often remained short-lived outrages. Until claims emerged.
Now it is finally in the Flemish coalition agreement. Furthermore, a painting by Henry Gibbs is returning from the Tate Britain and Minister Caroline Gennez is setting up a commission to settle claims and organise provenance investigations.
In early 2020, he published in De Standaard that the Royal Library had a watercolour by Félicien Rops from a forced auction in Nice. When the book Kunst voor Das Reich came out in late 2022, claims around works in the Fine Arts museums of Brussels, Ghent and Antwerp followed.
Since then, nothing has happened. Five years after the Dorville family's demand for the Rops painting, it has still not been returned. Two and a half years after the claims addressed to the three Fine Arts Museums, the families are still waiting for an answer. Nothing could be done either, because there were no instruments for it.
This is about to change at the Flemish level. After a few nudges in the previous coalition period, the subject is now in the Flemish coalition agreement. Minister of Culture Caroline Gennez (Vooruit) is committed to tackling the file. ‘Unlike other occupied countries like the Netherlands or France, we have remained passive for too long,’ she says. "We need to catch up. Art that has been looted or forcibly sold must return to its rightful owners."
As a first step, she wants to develop a framework to settle claims and organise provenance research. To this end, she has formed a six-member committee with lawyers, historians and art historians.
Read Geert's entire article via Het Nieuwsblad or De Gazet van Antwerpen or read more about the return of the Henry Gibbs painting from Tate Britain (Tate Britain returns Nazi-Looted Painting after Investigation by Belgian Journalist Geert Sels via Artdependence.com)
