The story of looted art during WWII is brought back to life in the exhibition “Stolen Jewish Legacies: The Fate of the Andriesse Collection” at the Holocaust Museum (Kazerne Dossin) in Mechelen.
The dramatic story of the looting and partial recovery of a valuable Belgian art and textile collection was presented in November 2024 at the Jewish Museum in Brussels but only for one day because of the museum’s closure for renovations. The exhibition is now back on view on the fourth floor of the museum in Mechelen until the end of February 2025.
The exhibition traces the lives and cultural impact of the Belgian-Jewish philanthropists and art collectors Hugo Daniel Andriesse (1867-1942) and his wife Elisabeth Andriesse (1871-1963). It is the first exhibition of its kind in Belgium about the Nazi looting of cultural property.
The Andriesses were socially prominent benefactors of charitable institutions in pre-war Brussels who collected Old Master paintings and tapestries. Following their dramatic escape via France and Portugal to New York in 1940, their collection of paintings and tapestries was looted during the Nazi occupation of Belgium. Some of the collection remains missing.
“Through archival documentation, we have pieced together the biographies of the Andriesses and the journey of their nearly forgotten collection, from its seizure during the Nazi occupation to its partial recovery after the war,” explained exhibition curator Anne Uhrlandt, Research and Documentation Officer at the Jewish Digital Cultural Recovery Project (JDCRP).
As a precaution before the war, Jewish families deposited their artworks for safekeeping at the Royal Museum of Art and History at Cinquantenaire Park in Brussels. So did also the Andriesses who entrusted their art and textile collection to the museum in 1939. But during the war, the collection (28 boxes of paintings, 5 tapestries and 17 oriental carpets) was confiscated by the Nazis and transferred to its headquarters in Paris.
