Heirs of Holocaust victims and their representatives filed two lawsuits in California on a Monday seeking the return of artworks currently held by the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena and the Auschwitz Memorial in Poland. The legal actions follow the passage of new state and federal laws intended to strengthen claims for art taken during the Nazi era. Between 1933 and 1945, the Nazi regime seized more than 600,000 works of art across Europe from Jewish families, collectors, and museums.
The lawsuit against the Norton Simon Museum, filed by the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, seeks the return of two 1530 oil-on-panel paintings by Lucas Cranach the Elder titled "Adam and Eve." The federation represents the interests of Marei von Saher, the heir of Dutch Jewish art dealer Jacques Goudstikker, who says the works were seized by Nazi official Hermann Göring. The museum stated that it legally holds the titles, noting that a federal court in 2018 previously ruled in its favor and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the case in May 2019. The museum says Goudstikker originally purchased the paintings in 1931 at an auction of works belonging to the Stroganoff family that the museum characterized as illicit.
The second lawsuit was filed in federal court by the daughters of Dinah Gottliebova Babbitt, a Holocaust survivor and animator. They are seeking the return of watercolors Gottliebova Babbitt was forced to paint for Nazi physician Josef Mengele while imprisoned at Auschwitz. Pawel Sawicki, a spokesperson for the Auschwitz Memorial, stated the works must remain at the memorial to document crimes committed at the camp. Sawicki argued the paintings should not be classified as Nazi-looted art because they were created by a prisoner and, according to the memorial, the artist never held ownership of them.
The litigation centers on California Assembly Bill 2867, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom in September 2024. This law mandates that California state law applies in recovery suits brought by residents or heirs involving art seized during the Holocaust or other periods of persecution. The law was authored by Assemblyman Jesse Gabriel (D-Woodland Hills) in response to a federal court ruling that allowed a Spanish museum to keep a Camille Pissarro painting taken from the Cassirer family in 1939.
What happens next depends on upcoming court dates and the interpretation of the 2024 law. A related case involving the Cassirer family's Pissarro painting is expected to be heard in a California federal court next month. The Norton Simon Museum has indicated it will continue to display the Cranach paintings, while the Auschwitz Memorial maintains that removing the watercolors would cause irreparable harm to the memory of the victims. No specific trial dates for the two new lawsuits were reported.