Kunstsammlungen Zu Weimar v. Elicofon

536 F.Supp. 829 (1982)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Until 1927, the Duerer portraits which are the subject of this suit formed part of the private art collection of the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach. Under the terms of a Settlement Agreement of 1927 title to the Grand, Ducal Art Collection had been transferred to the Land of Thuringia. Thuringia was created by Federal German Law of April 20, 1920, and was the legal successor to the territory of Weimar, which included as one of its seven subdivisions Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, the territory over which the Grand Dukes formerly had presided before being ousted from power. The Duerer paintings remained on exhibit in a museum in Weimar, Thuringia, known as the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar, the predecessor to the Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar. But in 1943, Dr. Walter Scheidig, the then Director of the Staatliche, had the Duerers and other valuable items of the museum transferred to a storeroom in a wing of a nearby castle, the Schloss Schwarzburg, located in the District of Rudolstadt in the Land of Thuringia, where they remained until their disappearance in the summer of 1945. The Land of Thuringia was designated to be part of the Soviet Zone of Occupation. On April 14, 1969, retroactive to January 1, 1969, the Minister of Culture of the German Democratic Republic, issued an order conferring juridical personality upon the former Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, which thereafter became known as the Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar, a status which under East German Law entitled the Kunstsammlungen to maintain suit for return of the Duerers. The Kunstsammlungen (P) moved to intervene as a plaintiff in this action for return of the Duerer portraits in April 1969. It was denied as the US did not recognize East Germany. The United States extended formal recognition, and the court permitted the Kunstsammlungen to file its complaint. D had bought the paintings from an ex-serviceman. D publicly disclosed he had the paintings and P sued. P presented uncontradicted testimony regarding their disappearance. P moved for summary judgment. D moved for summary judgment claiming that the theft did not preclude a finding that the serviceman who sold them had acquired good title.