Robert Edsel's Blog

Since its founding almost 3 years ago the Monuments Men Foundation has been working to encourage museums and collectors alike to comply with best practices guidelines. Simply stated, that means “know your collection” and where the objects were during the reign of the Nazis:  1933-1946.  Many museums, and some collectors, have embraced these guidelines. Some have been slow to catch up. A few continue to ignore the matter.

Belo’s Dallas station, WFAA, an ABC affiliate, broadcast a piece last evening highlighting a recent case we discovered several years ago at SMU’s Meadows Museum in conjunction with research on my first book, Rescuing Da Vinci.  Officials at the Meadows are now aggressively engaged conducting key provenance research on their collection as a whole and the two paintings covered by the story in particular, to their credit.

This case highlights one aspect of the work of the Foundation and the tangible results we continue to obtain while trying to work with important institutions like the Meadows Museum.

You can view the story by clicking on the following link:

http://www.wfaa.com/news/local/Art-Stolen-by-Hitler-Found-at-SMU-Meadows-Museum.html

Monuments Men Foundation Announces that Famous Murillo Paintings Stolen from Rothschild Family in Paris, later discovered by the Monuments Men during World War II, have been Identified at SMU’s Meadows Museum

Dallas, TX (October 22, 2009) — Based on new evidence about the systematic looting of art from Jewish owners in the course of hostilities in Europe during World War II, a pair of famous paintings on display at SMU’s Meadows Museum created by Spanish master Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1618-1682) of Seville’s Patron Saints Justa and Rufina, estimated to be worth more than $10 million, are believed to have been stolen from the Rothschild family in Paris in 1941. The Nazi ERR (Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) code evidencing Rothschild ownership is still visible on the stretcher bar of one of the paintings; it appears to have been rubbed off the other. The Monuments Men Foundation, recipient of the 2007 National Humanities Medal for its work preserving the legacy of these unknown heroes, which it received from the President of the United States at a White House ceremony, is continuing its research to document conclusively whether both paintings were properly restituted to the rightful owners prior to donation to the Meadows Museum.

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