Dec 15, 2020

Loebl in the Kleinberger archives

 


Network described in the 1946 OSS Art Looting Investigation Unit (ALIU) Final Report Red Flag List of Names: Ali (Allen) Loebl and Bruno Lohse

https://www.lootedart.com/MVI3RM469661

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The OSS ALIU Reports on Nazi looting networks in Europe put Allen Loebl at the center of a syndicate of art dealers trading Nazi looted art. Loebl appears in the Red Flag Name index and is mentioned in the Final report fourteen times. The ALIU investigators who drafted the Final Report specified that Loebl had close ties to Bruno Lohse, a notorious Nazi art plunderer. 

At the very least, the mention of Loebl in a provenance from the Nazi era (1933-1945) should mobilise provenance researchers and Holocaust researchers to trace the full history of the artwork in question and to verify whether the artwork belonged to a Jewish collector or dealer who was persecuted when Hitler came to power.  

In this context, the publication of the Kleinberger Archives represents a major step forward

https://cdm16028.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16028coll23/search/searchterm/loebl

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It was chiefly through LOEBL that LOHSE became familiar with the Paris art trade, and became acquainted with such other dealers and Victor MANDEL, PERDOUX and ENGEL, who operated as an informal syndicate. (See Consolidated Interrogation Report No. 3, "German Methods of Acquisition, " Dealers.)


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The Kleinberger archives are now online. 

Searching is fast and easy. Results show all the mentions, as well as the artists and more. 

Below is the result of a simple search for Loebl, (cousin of Kleinberger president Harry Sperling and a Red Flag Name for his involvement in selling Nazi looted art).

https://cdm16028.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16028coll23/search/searchterm/loebl




The artists concerned by these transactions (according to the website) include:




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The Kleinberger Archives offer new possibilities for research.


note: Under Harry Sperling, the president of Kleinberger and Allen Loebl's cousin, the Kleinberger art dealership got up to all kinds of tricky business. 


Sperling deserves a serious investigative biography that takes into account his art dealing, smuggling, and intelligence-related activities, which are attested in numerous documents.

This new resource, which makes it possible to quickly search through the Kleinberger files, should help researchers who want to shed like on these transactions.

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