Australia’s art galleries are falling behind the rest of the world in their approach to stolen art and restitution disputes, says the lawyer who brought the only successful restitution claim against an Australian gallery over Nazi art, with the country’s cultural institutions having turned a blind eye to theft.
German lawyer Olaf Ossmann, who spearheaded Australia’s first successful Nazi restitution claim against the National Gallery of Victoria, told The Australian the country’s leading galleries remain “reactive and not proactive” in their approach to artworks with questionable provenance.
It comes after The Australian revealed the descendants of a wealthy Jewish merchant were preparing to revive a longstanding restitution case against the NGV for a painting they claim was sold to the Nazis under duress and later acquired by the gallery in 1945. Mr Ossmann, who will lead the claim on behalf of the family, said Australia’s art galleries appeared to be falling behind international standards set in Europe, the US and Britain and had not adapted their practices.
“The reaction to restitution claims by many art institutions around the world more than a decade ago was simply ‘Show us your papers, we check it and if it’s not sufficient, you just have to go back home and do your homework’.
Read the article by Nicholas Jensen in The Australian.