A renowned billionaire art dealer has been mandated to return a valuable Amedeo Modigliani painting to the descendants of a Jewish owner who was dispossessed of the artwork during the Nazi regime in France.
The painting in question, a 1918 oil portrait that portrays a chocolate merchant adorned in a hat and tie, has been appraised at approximately $25 million, as reported by The New York Times.
On Friday, a decision was rendered by New York Supreme Court Judge Joel M. Cohen, confirming that the artwork, known as ‘Seated Man With a Cane,’ was initially owned by Oscar Stettiner, an antiques dealer who operated in Paris.
The judge has instructed David Nahmad, the billionaire whose holding company is the current owner, to relinquish the painting.
“Oscar Stettiner owned or at a minimum had a superior right of possession of the painting prior to its unlawful seizure,” stated Cohen in his ruling.
After being confiscated by the Nazis and subsequently sold to an undisclosed purchaser, the painting reappeared on the art market during a 1996 auction.
Nahmad’s firm International Art Center, bought the work at the auction and has kept it in Switzerland ever since.
The Nahmad family has been in the art business for generations and long resisted the effort by Stettiner’s estate to recover the painting.
Stettiner himself had brought a legal claim to court in 1946 after World War II ended. A French court ruled in his favor and ordered the painting be returned to him, but it had already been sold to a man who no longer had it in his possession.
Pictured: ‘Seated Man With a Cane’, a 1918 work by Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani
Oscar Stettiner, a Jewish art dealer, owned the painting. It was confiscated from his Paris shop by the Nazis. His descendants won a court battle this week to get the work returned to his estate
Stettiner died in 1948, never having recovered the painting.
The lawsuit against Nahmad and his holding company was filed in 2015 by Stettiner’s grandson, Philippe Maestracci. Also involved in the suit was Mondex, a company that specializes in recovering stolen art.
‘Our client, Mr. Maestracci, is overwhelmed with joy and the satisfaction that after so many years the quest of his grandfather has finally been fulfilled,’ James Palmer, Mondex’s founder, told The Times.
‘We now look forward to Mr. Nahmad to abide by his promise to return the painting upon receiving the order of the court, which today he has now received,’ Palmer added.
A lawyer for the Stettiner estate, Phillip Landrigan, accused Nahmad and his lawyers of dragging out litigation in hopes that ‘the heir would be forced to give up’.
For years, the case was largely focused on whether Nahmad was even connected to International Art Center, the company that bought the painting 30 years ago. Eventually, Nahmad conceded he ran the company.
In interviews, Nahmad defended himself by saying he had loaned the painting out to several museums, including the Jewish Museum in Manhattan in 2004.
Billionaire David Nahmad (pictured with his son Joseph and wife Collette) bought the painting in 1996 from a Christie’s art auction. Nahmad was ordered by the judge to hand it over
Modigliani spent his adulthood in Paris, where he painted portraits and nudes in a surreal style. He was also a sculptor
‘If you had any doubt about looted art, would you really lend it to a Jewish museum?’ Nahmad told The Times in 2016.
Even though the Stettiner family had been misled about where the painting was for 50 years, Judge Cohen said, the Nahmad family was not at fault for that. Nahmad bought the work through Christie’s.
The judge said he found the evidence tying Stettiner to the painting were compelling. Records showed he lent the work for a 1930 exhibition in Venice.
‘The evidence shows a straightforward and persuasive chain of ownership/right of possession flowing directly from Mr. Stettiner to Nazi seizure to a forced sale,’ the judge said.
Modigliani, who painted the work Stettiner’s family just recovered, was born in Northern Italy to a Sephardic Jewish family in 1884.
In 1906, he moved to Paris, where he began his career. He was a painter and a sculptor, becoming well known for his portraits and nudes that depicted people with surreal proportions.
His work was considered scandalous and controversial while he was alive but later saw great acclaim after his death in 1920. He died at age 35 of meningitis caused by a tuberculosis infection.
In 2015, one of his nude portraits, ‘Nu couché’, sold at a Christie’s auction in New York City for $170.4 million, making it one of the most expensive painting ever sold.
