Some of the paths taken

Notes and references

The focus of our research has been the Kunstraub (art theft) policy of the Third Reich, in particular the Sonderauftrag Linz (Special Assignment Linz), Hitler's secret project to house the best of the gathered art in a vast museum to be built in the city of his youth. His own plans and elevation sketches exist, as do the detailed plans and some of the models of Giesler and Frick, the assigned architects. The project raises certain questions.
Records of these events, like the events themselves, are contradictory. Accounts range from self-serving journalistic efforts to eyewitness reports, government records to historical compendia of destroyed or displaced works, and list after list of who had what, what went where, and when. Together these give us a shifting, incomplete reflection of one possible relationship between art and politics, and of the several kinds of madness at work in the glorification of the state, then and since.
What follows is a grouping of notes and references drawn together by some of the artists who have been thinking about these questions. This list, far from comprehensive, and not yet in alphabetical order, is made up of notes by Bernie Miller and Jeanne Randolph, library and Web site lists compiled by Daniel Olson, some of my own (VF) discoveries, detective work by Anna Wieler, and an ancillary reference list from Betty Spackman and Anja Westerfrölke.
Though rough, these notes and lists are nevertheless a kind of tracing of where we've been. New entries are being added as we go, and you are invited to contribute names of articles or books or offer comments you consider essential to the interrelated questions of missing art, collecting fever, culture and politics, and the Führermuseum.

Please send your message to: Artworks@yorku.ca

An interim bibliography

SUBJECTS: Art thefts--Europe.
World War, 1939-1945--Destruction and pillage--Europe.
Hitler,Adolf, 1889-1945.

AUTHOR: Alford, Kenneth D.
TITLE: The spoils of World War II : the American military's role in the stealing of Europe's treasures /
PUBLISHED: Secaucus, NJ : Carol Pub. Group, c1994.
NOTES: "A Birch Lane Press book."

AUTHOR: Smyth, Craig Hugh.
TITLE: Repatriation of art from the Collecting Point in Munich after World War II
PUBLISHED: Maarssen : Gary Schwartz ; Montclair, NJ : Distributed in North
America by Abner Schram, c1988.

ENTRY TITLE: Schuldig geboren. English.
TITLE: Born guilty : children of Nazi families / [compiled by] Peter
Sichrovsky ; translated from the German
PUBLISHED: London: I.B. Tauris, c1988.

AUTHOR: Friedländer, Saul, 1932-
UNIFORM TITLE: Reflets du nazisme. English
TITLE: Reflections of Nazism : an essay on kitsch and death / Saul
Friedländer; translated from the French
New York: Harper & Row. 1984.

AUTHOR: Breker, Arno, 1900-
TITLE: Paris, Hitler et moi [Traduit de l'allemand par Jean-Pierre Tafforeau.]
PUBLISHED: Paris Presses de la Cité, 1970

AUTHOR: Kubin, Ernst.
TITLE: Sonderauftrag Linz: die Kunstsammlung Adolf Hitlers :
Apbau, Vernichtungsplan, Rettung: ein Thriller
PUBLISHED: Wien: Orac, c1989.
NOTES: Includes index.

AUTHOR: Kurz, Jakob, 1931-
TITLE: Kunstraub in Europa : 1938-1945 / Jakob Kurz. --
PUBLISHED: Hamburg : Facta Oblit
NOTES: Includes bibliographical references (p. 443-444).

AUTHOR: De Jaeger, Charles.
TITLE: The Linz file: Hitler's plunder of Europe's art /
PUBLISHED: Exeter, England: Webb & Bower, 1981.
NOTES: Includes index.

AUTHOR: Wortman, Michael.
TITLE: Baldur von Schirach, Hitlers Jugendführer
PUBLISHED: Köln : Bühlauc1982.
NOTES: Rev. ed. of the author's thesis (doctoral)

Verlorene Werke der Malerei; in Deutschland in der Zeit von 1939 bis 1945
München, F.A. Kunstverlag Akermann [1965]
31225 plates (part col.)

AUTHOR: Maser, Werner, 1922-
TITLE: Hitler's letters and notes / Werner Maser ; translated by Arnold Pomerans. --
PUBLISHED: London : Heinemann, [1974]
NOTES: Slightly adapted translation of Hitlers Briefe und

AUTHOR: Hoffmann,Heinrich, 1885-1957
TITLE: Hitler, wie ich ihn sah : Aufzeichnungen seines Leibfotografen, translated by Arnold Pomerans.
PUBLISHED: München: Hebig, [c1974]

The Jackdaw of Linz
David Roxan and Ken Wanstall.
PUBLISHED: London: White Lion Publishers, 1976.

AUTHOR: Valland, Rose
TITLE: Le front de l'art : défense des collections françaises, 1939-1945
PUBLISHED: Paris : Plon, 1961.
SUBJECTS: Art--France--Galleries and museums

Friemuth, Cay.
Die geraubte Kunst: der dramatische Wettlauf um die Rettung der
Kulturschütze nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg
Braunschweig: Westermann, c1989.
NOTES: Includes bibliographical refernces

Simon, Matila.
The battle of the Louvre; the struggle to save French art in World War II.
New York, Hawthorn Books. 1971.

TITLE: Captured German and related records: a National Archives conference: papers and proceedings of
PUBLISHED: Athens: Ohio University Press, [1975] c1974.

TITLE: Le pillage par les Allemands des oeuvres d'art et des biblothèques
appartenant à des Juifs en France
PUBLISHED: Paris : Éditions du Centre, 1947.
SERIES: Série Documents - Centre de documentation Juive Contemporaine ; no. 4
SUBJECTS: World War, 1939-1945--Art and the war
David, Ken: ris: Éditions du Centre,

Grosshans, Henry.
Hitler and the artists
New York : Holmes & Meier, 1983)

The Nazification of art: art, design, music, architecture and film in the Third Reich
edited by Brandon Taylor and Wilfried van der Will.
Winchester, Hampshire : Winchester Press, Winchester School of Art, 1990.

Hinz, Berthold.
Art in the Third Reich; translated from the German by Robert and Rita Kimber.
New York: Pantheon Books, c1979.
Translation of Die Malerei im deutschen Faschismus.

Adam, Peter.
Art of the Third Reich
New York: H.N. Abrams, c1992.

Steinweis, Alan E.
Art, ideology, & economics in Nazi Germany : the Reich chambers of music, theater, and the visual arts
Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, c1993.

********************************************************* Hello Vera, Here's something I found, and am sending as a test of this sending option. http://gopher.nara.gov:70/0/inform/guide/200s/rg239.txt I will also send you Hitler's skull (with any luck.)

Daniel

********************************* Records of the American Commission for the Protection and Salvage
of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas (Record Group 239)
1942-47
61 cu. ft.

239.1 ADMINISTRATIVE HISTORY

Established: Under the chairmanship of Associate Justice Owen J. Roberts, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, June 23, 1943, and announced by Secretary of State Cordell Hull, August 20, l943.

Functions: Cooperated with the U.S. Army in protecting cultural treasures and gathered information about war damage to such treasures. Compiled data on cultural property appropriated by the Axis Powers and encouraged its restitution. Compiled maps showing locations of areas or sites in enemy or enemy-occupied areas that were to be spared destruction if possible.

Assisted by the private American Defense-Harvard Group and by the American Council of Learned Societies' Committee on the Protection of Cultural Treasures in War Areas, which turned over its research files to the commission.

Abolished: June 30, l946.

Successor Agencies: Department of State (restoration of art objects), as announced by department, August 16, 1946.

Finding Aids: H. Stephen Helton and Philip C. Brooks, comps., William J. Lescure, rev., "Preliminary Inventory of the Records of the American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas," NC 124 (Aug. 1965).

Security-Classified Records: This record group may include material that is security-classified.

Subject Access Terms: World War II agency.

RECORDS

 
RECORD TYPES           RECORD LOCATIONS          QUANTITIES 
Textual Records            Washington Area                 59 cu. ft. 
Maps and Charts            College Park                 1,489 items 
Aerial Photographs         College Park                   124 items 
Still Pictures             College Park                19,950 images

239.2 RECORDS OF THE COMMISSION, l942-47

57 lin. ft. and 10 rolls of microfilm

Textual Records:

Minutes, 1943-46. Applications and letters of recommendation, 1943-46. Correspondence and other records of Commissioner Paul Sachs, 1942-46. General correspondence, 1943- 46. Fiscal records, 1943-47. Lists and handbooks concerning cultural institutions in Europe, 1943-45. Allied military government records, including final reports of the Mediterranean and European Theaters of Operations, drawn from the "Analytical File," 1945-46. Reports of the Art Looting Investigation Unit, including some reports of the Office of Strategic Services and the Strategic Services Unit, 1945-46. Microfilm copy of lists of war damaged areas and buildings in Japan, origin unknown, 1946 (10 rolls).

Related Records: Department of State central decimal file, in RG 59, General Records of the Department of State. Records of the Civil Affairs Division, in RG 165, Records of the War Department General and Special Staffs.

Subject Access Terms: Art looting; Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives Section.

239.3 CARTOGRAPHIC RECORDS (GENERAL) 1943-46 1,613 items

Maps (1,489 items): Base maps of provinces, regions, and cultural sites in Europe and Asia, photocopied with overlays marking sites that were to be spared destruction (a few maps are originals with manuscript overlays), 1943-46; with accompanying documentation, consisting of a set of instructions for the preparation of maps, lists of maps, and site identification lists attached to the maps.

Aerial Photographs (124 items): Italian and Spanish cities, and Tinian Island in the Marianas, ca. 1944.

Subject Access Terms: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, China, Corsica, Czechoslovakia, Dalmatia, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Indochina, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Java, Korea, Marianas, the Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Romania, Sardinia, Sicily, and Yugoslavia.

239.4 STILL PICTURES (GENERAL) 1943-46 19,950 images

Photographs: Europe, North Africa, Palestine, the Philippine Islands, Burma, China, and the Netherlands East Indies, collected by the Photo Archives Unit, showing depositories and looted artwork, effects of bomb damage and vandalism to cities and monuments, liberation by the Allies, and commission employees, 1943-46 (PA, RC; 19,650 images).

Survey of war damage to cultural institutions and monuments in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 1946 (SFM, 300 images).

************************************************** Lost Works Bibliographic Information

Long after the American Monuments Officers had left Germany, Rose Valland continued her quest to retrieve or account for every single thing that had left France. In her last years she retreated entirely into her world of secret documents, which at her death were relegated in an unsorted and chaotic mess to a Musée storeroom in Malmaison.

In Germany Wilhellm Arntz, a Lawyer, spent years trying to track down every single 'degenerate' picture removed by the Nazis.

The USSR returned most of the Dresden and Berlin collections in their possession to the GDR in the late 50's.

In all nations, most of the records relating to confiscation and recovery lay classified and often sealed for terms of 50 years or more.

Since the unification of Germany and the end of the Cold War the French Foreign Ministry has retrieved Rose Valland's Papers and is busily perusing them at the Quai d'Orsay.

The search for missing works of Art still goes on. International law enforcement agencies and private foundations such as the Institute for Art Research in New York keep an eye on the markets.

************************* Possible Research Leads: Record Group 5a at the National Archives is the records of the Fine Arts and Monuments Advisor !949-1969

Record group 239 Records of the American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas

Record Group 260. Records of the U.S. Occupation Headquarters. World War II, Ardelia Hall Collection: Records of the Collecting Points.

"Looted Art Treasures Go Back to France" The Quartermaster Review September/October 1946

Works of Art in Italy : "Losses and Survivals in the War". Volumes 1 and 2 London: His Majesty's Stationary Office 1945

Craig H. Smyth "Repatriation of Art From the Collection Point in Munich After WWII" The Hague: Gerson Lecture, Schwartz/SDUm 1988

Thomas C. Howe "Saltmines and Castles" New York: Bobbs Merrill 1946

Bureau Central des Restitutions "Répertoire des Biens Spoliés en France durant la Guerre 1939-1945" Berlin 1947

American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas "Report on American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic and Historic Monuments in War Areas." Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office 1946

NA, RG 239/77 OSS/ALIU CIR 4, Faison "Linz: Hitler's Museum and Library" December 14, 1945 P.2

NA 260/386 II, Ledgers for Linz operation

NA, RG 239?77 CIR LINZ Attatchments2,5,8,35a,60 and supplement

R.Valland, "Le Front de l'Art " Paris 1961

Report on Activities of ERR in Netherlands, Nuremberg Document 175PS CIR ERR Attatchment 9

Getty Centre Archives, List and letter, Valland December 10, 1962 as well as Reutti, "Reports on Post-War Activities" MS

J. Flanner "Men and Monuments" New York, 1957

Album of Photos, Contents Ricoveri, Führer's birthday April 20, 1945: Hartt papers, Ringler Report pp. 12-13

"History of the Wiesbaden Collecting Point July 13, 1945-March 5, 1946 Courtesy: W. Farmer

Archives of American Art, Washington D.C. Thomas Carr Howe Papers James J. Rorimer Papers George Stout Papers

NA, RG 239/84, DIR VOSS

M. Kurtz, "Nazi Contraband" New York 1985

***************************************** Some interesting notes:

Glenn Lowry appears in L.H.N. Bibliography: "A Jeweller's Eye" Exhibition catalogue Washington D.C. Smithsonian, 1988
Hans Van Meegeren, the Vermeer Forger, who sold a large fake to Goering (who never did realize it) was arrested not for forgery but for economic collaboration with the Nazis.
Maurice de Rothschild stayed in Toronto during the War.
Theodore Heinrich, former Director of the Royal Ontario Museum and later faculty member at York University's Department of Visual Arts, was the MFAA Officer at Wiesbaden collecting point, left his papers to the University of Regina in Saskatchewan.
S.A. Williams' M.A. Thesis, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University 1974 : "The Polish Art Treasury in Canada"
A. Ritchie "The Restitution of Art Loot" Gallery notes (Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo N.Y. ) July 1946
John Dornberg "The Mounting Embarrassment of Germany's Nazi Treasures" Art News, September 1988
Michael H. Kater of York University, University Professor, and one of the leading scholars on the Third Reich, attended a national conference at Ohio University in 1972 called "Captured German and Related Records" organized by Robert Wolfe of the Captured War records dept. of the National Archives (proceedings published by Ohio University Press in 1974).

****************************************************************
Research sources gathered by Anja Westerfrölke and Betty Spackman, Linz:

AUTHOR : Speer, Albert
TITLE : Erinnerungen
PUBLISHER : Ullstein/Propylaen, Frankfurt/M - Berlin 1969

AUTHOR : Fest, Joachim C.
TITLE : Hitler, Eine Biographie
PUBLISHER : Ullstein, Frankfurt/M - Berlin - Vienna 1973

AUTHOR : Hitler, Adolf
TITLE : Mein Kampf
PUBLISHER : Zentralverlag der NSDAP, Munich 1927

AUTHOR : Sudholt, Dr. Gert, ed.
TITLE : Adolf Hitlers Drei Testamente, Ein Zeitdokument
PUBLISHER : Druffel, Leoni am Starnberger See/Germany 1977

AUTHOR : Price, Billy F.
TITLE : Adolf Hitler als Maler und Zeichner
PUBLISHER : Gallant, Zug/Switzerland 1983

AUTHOR : Kubin, Ernst
TITLE : Sonderauftrag Linz
PUBLISHER : Orac, Vienna 1989

AUTHOR : Fischer, Gerhard, ed.
TITLE : Die Stadt und die Wildnis, Wien 1000 - 1500, (Eine Ausstellung von daedalus - Wien)
PUBLISHER :Stromfeld/Roter Stern, Basel - Frankfurt/M 1992

AUTHOR : Murray, Peter and Linda,
TITLE : Dictionary of Art and Artists
PUBLISHER : Penguin, Suffolk,1989

AUTHOR : Heinsohn,Gunnar
TITLE : Warum Auschwitz? Hitlers Plan und die Ratlosigkeit der Nachwelt
PUBLISHER : Rowohlt, Hamburg, 1995

AUTHOR : Purin, Bernhard, ed.
TITLE : Beschlagnahmt, Die Sammlung des J�dischen Museums nach 1938 (Eine Ausstellung des 1995 J�disches Museum Wien)
PUBLISHER: J�disches Museum der Stadt Wien, Vienna 1995 ART Das Kunstmagazin, C1084 E, Nr. 4 / April 1983, S.26ff DIE ZEIT Magazin, Nr. 45/ 3.November 1995, S.14ff Wiener Zeitung, Nr.97, 8. April 1938, S.1f Wiener Zeitung, Amtsblatt, 1. Februar 1986, S. 25ff Profil, Nr. 44, 30. Oktober 1995, 26.Jg., S.36ff Profil, Nr. 6, 5. Februar 1996, 27.Jg., S18ff Kronen Zeitung, Jan.31, 1996 Ober�sterreichische Nachrichten, Jan.31, Feb.6, 1996

****************************************************************

From: "C.H. Kwint"
Organization: Faculteit der Letteren, RuG, NL
Date: Tuesday, 25 February 1997
Subject: Bibliography

I would consider it as an honor to have my name included in the bibliography section of the Body Missing website. Unfortunately I don't have the time to translate my thesis into English due to my internship at a school. (Where I taught the children about this topic). The title of my thesis is " The Aryan as an Artcreator" Subtitle: "Art and National-Socialism". The thesis consists of 24 pages.

Christian Kwint
University of Groningen
Faculty of Arts.

Here is the bibliography prepared by Christian Kwint:

ENGLISH LITERATURE:

AUTHOR: K. Akinsha & G. Kozlov with S. Hochfield,
TITLE: " Stolen treasure. The hunt for the world's masterpieces". (London 1995).

AUTHOR: R. Chamberlain,
TITLE: " Loot! The heritage of plunder". (Japan 1983).

AUTHOR: J.E. Elen,
TITLE: " Missing old master drawings from the Franz Koenigs collection, claimed by the State of The Netherlands". (Den Haag 1989).

AUTHOR: T.C. Howe Jr.,
TITLE: " Salt mines and castles. The discovery and restitution of looted European art". (New York 1946).

AUTHOR: C. de Jaeger,
TITLE: " The Linz file. Hitler's plunder of Europe's art". (Exeter 1981).

AUTHOR: L.H. Nicholas,
TITLE: " The rape of Europa. The fate of Europe's treasures in the Third Reich and the Second World War". (New York 1994).

GERMAN LITERATURE:

AUTHOR: H. Brenner,
TITLE: " Die Kunstpolitik des National-sozialismus". (Muenchen 1963).

AUTHOR: G. Busch,
TITLE: " Entartete Kunst. Geschichte und Moral". (Frankfurt am Main 1969).
AUTHOR: F. Roh,
TITLE: " Entartete Kunst. Kunstbarbarei im Dritten Reich". (Hannover 1962).

DUTCH LITERATURE:

AUTHOR: F.J. Duparc,
TITLE: " Een eeuwige strijd voor Nederlands cultureel erfgoed". (Den Haag 1975).

AUTHOR: D. Hannema,
TITLE: " Flitsen uit mijn leven". (Amsterdam 1973).

AUTHOR: E. van Konijnenburg,
TITLE: " Roof, Restitutie, Reparatie. (proefschrift) (Arnhem 1948).

AUTHOR: A. Venema,
TITLE: " Kunsthandel in Nederland 1940-1945". (Amsterdam 1986).

TITLE: " De betwiste voogdij over een kunstschat"
PUBLISHER: Het Parool 20-5-1995.

TITLE: " Kunst en liegwerk"
PUBLISHER: Volkskrant 15-2-1986.

TITLE: " Nederlandse claim op collectie Koenigs is geheel legitiem"
PUBLISHER: Volkskrant 14-5-1991.

****************************************************************

To be continued ...
The story is always partial.
"Partial to what?" you say ...