A small number of Nazi-era artwork from a reclusive German collector’s trove has been presented in Bonn in preparation for a wider exhibition.
News agency dpa reported that the German city’s Bundeskunsthalle on Tuesday previewed works by Monet, Maillol, Boucher and Duerer and a marble statue by Rodin.
Switzerland’s Kunstmuseum Bern plans to show several other pieces from the Cornelius Gurlitt collection Friday, and the two museums will open simultaneous exhibitions of hundreds of works in November.
Gurlitt died in 2014, months after German authorities announced they had seized the art trove at his Munich apartment. He had kept more than 1,200 works in Munich and another 250 in Salzburg, Austria.
His will designated the German museum as sole heir. A legal battle ensued when a cousin of Gurlitt, Uta Werner, challenged the testament on the grounds that Gurlitt wasn’t mentally fit when he wrote it shortly before his death — a case rejected in December by a Munich court.
