German museum to return Nazi-looted Stern art

Jason Kenney

On March 5 in Berlin, Concordia University will reclaim a painting that belonged to the late German Jewish art dealer Max Stern before the Nazis forced him to sell off the holdings of his Dusseldorf gallery in 1937.

This is the 10th artwork recovered since the Concordia-led Max Stern Art Restitution Project was launched 10 years ago. The only information being released at this time is that the painting is from a German museum.

The return will take place at the Canadian embassy concurrently with the formal handing over of the chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance from Belgium to Canada. The Alliance is a non-governmental organization promoting Holocaust remembrance, education and research.

Stern, who died in 1987, settled permanently in Montreal after World War II and became, as owner of the Dominion Gallery, one of Canada’s most important art dealers and collectors.

Childless, he bequeathed the bulk of his estate to Concordia, as well as McGill University and Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The Restitution Project, directed through Concordia’s office of the president, works in close collaboration with the New York state-based Holocaust Claims Processing Office, as well as the Art Loss Register, Interpol, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other institutions and governments agencies worldwide. The first painting was restituted in 2006.

Present at the ceremony will be Jason Kenney, federal minister of citizenship, immigration and multiculturalism; the incoming Alliance chair, Mario Silva, a former Toronto Liberal MP who chaired the Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism, and Clarence Epstein, director of special projects and cultural affairs at Concordia, who has spearheaded the Stern project.