Britain’s Tate to return Nazi-looted painting to heirs of Jewish art collector

When Samuel Hartveld and his wife Claire Melboom fled Belgium in 1940, they left behind a collection of over 60 paintings that was later looted by the occupying Nazi government.

Hartveld, a Jewish Belgian art collector, never saw his artworks again. But now, the British government has ordered one of those paintings returned to Hartveld’s great-grandchildren.

The painting, a 1654 work by English artist Henry Gibbs, had previously been in Britain’s Tate Gallery collection for over three decades when the British government ordered it be repatriated.

“It is a profound privilege to help reunite this work with its rightful heirs, and I am delighted to see the spoliation process working successfully to make this happen,” said Maria Balshaw, the director of Tate, in a statement. “Although the artwork’s provenance was extensively investigated when it was acquired in 1994, crucial facts concerning previous ownership of the painting were not known.”

The artwork, titled “Aeneas and his Family Fleeing Burning Troy”, is believed to be a commentary on the exile caused by the English Civil War several years earlier, according to the gallery’s website.

The order to turn over the painting was recommended by Britain’s Spoliation Advisory Panel, which is charged with resolving claims for items in the British government’s ownership that were lost under Nazi occupation. The heirs of Hartveld initially made their request for the painting to the advisory panel last May. The family will be united with the painting sometime in the coming months, according to Balshaw’s statement.

“The painting was looted. Hartveld received not one franc for it,” the report from the advisory panel stated. The looting was an act of “racial persecution,” the report added.

Since the advisory panel was established in 2000, it has received 23 claims which resulted in the return of 14 works to the heirs of their original owners. In 2014, the Tate Gallery also returned a Nazi-looted painting to the descendents of a Hungarian art collector following a report from the advisory panel.