Prosecutors launch probe into Argentina couple over Nazi-looted painting

Authorities in Argentina have opened a criminal investigation into the daughter of a former Nazi official and her spouse after an 18th-century painting stolen from a late Jewish art dealer was recovered from one of their properties.

Prosecutors announced the probe on Thursday, which will focus on Juan Carlos Cortegoso and his wife Patricia Kadgien, whose father was the fugitive Nazi officer Friedrich Kadgien.

The elder Kadgien died in the late 1970s. He spent the final decades of his life in Argentina, having fled Germany at the end of World War II.

He is believed to have brought with him priceless artworks looted from the collections of Jewish families and businesses, including that of the Dutch art dealer Jacques Goudstikker.

Goudstikker had amassed a collection of nearly 1,400 pieces, according to the meticulous records he kept.

But that made his collection a target for Nazi officials like Hermann Goring, who sought to seize the artwork for himself. The elder Kadgien was Goring’s financial adviser.

It is unclear how Kadgien came to own Portrait of a Lady by Giuseppe Ghislandi, an Italian portraitist prolific during the Baroque and Rococo periods.

The painting, a large portrait of the Contessa Colleoni holding gloves and a book, had not been seen in decades. As far as researchers knew, only black-and-white photographs of the artwork survived.

Goudstikker had been forced to sell many of his artworks to Nazi officials as the Holocaust unfolded in Europe.

In May 1940, the art dealer would ultimately die from a fall on board the SS Bodegraven, as he fled a genocide that would claim at least six million Jewish lives, as well as millions of prisoners-of-war, dissidents, LGBTQ people and those with disabilities.

Goudstikker’s heirs have been seeking to recover his collection ever since.

Thought lost, Portrait of a Lady reappeared suddenly last month, as the result of internet sleuthing.

Dutch journalists with the publication Algemeen Dagblad had been investigating the late Kadgien’s dealings with the Nazis, and they stumbled across a real estate listing from February for a house belonging to his daughter, Patricia Kadgien.

A picture in the listing showed Portrait of a Lady hanging above a green velvet couch.

The journalists published their findings on August 25, and soon after, police in Argentina raided the residence, which was located in the coastal city of Mar del Plata.

But the painting was nowhere to be found. Instead, authorities reported they had recovered other paintings, this time from the 19th century, that they suspected may also be Nazi-looted artwork.

A tapestry was found hanging where Portrait of a Lady was once photographed. The real estate listing, meanwhile, appeared to have been removed.

Police have since raided several properties belonging to Patricia Kadgien and her sister. On Wednesday, it was announced that the painting had finally been recovered.

But in Thursday’s hearing, federal authorities revealed they were charging Kadgien, 59, and her husband, Cortegoso, 62, with attempting a cover-up.

Prosecutor Carlos Martinez accused the couple of hiding the painting, despite being “aware that the artwork was being sought by the criminal justice system and international authorities”. That, he said, amounted to obstruction of justice and concealment.

“It was only after several police raids that they turned it in,” Martinez explained.

Patricia Kadgien and Cortegoso were briefly put under house arrest on Monday, though that was lifted in favour of a 180-day travel ban and a requirement that they seek court approval before leaving the house.

A lawyer for the couple reportedly asked a civil court this week to allow them to sell the painting, but that request was denied.

Martinez, meanwhile, told journalists on Thursday that Marei von Saher, one of Goudstikker’s heirs, had already reached out to the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the United States to ensure the painting’s restitution.

He explained that prosecutors had requested Portrait of a Lady be held at the Buenos Aires Holocaust Museum for now.