Heinemann and Mondschein (Frederick Mont) in provenances of artworks in American museums

The El Greco looted in 1944 by the Nazi Gestapo from Julius Priester passed through Rudolf J. Heinemann, (1901 – February 7, 1975) and the business he owned, Pinakos, and Frederick Mont (aka Fritz Mondschein) and the gallery he owned, Galerie Sanct Lukas, before being identified. The provenance of the looted artwork was falsified, and it took more than seventy years to find it, claim it and obtain restitution (in 2015). 

The obvious question for museums to ask themselves is: which artworks in our collections passed through these individuals or their businesses and are there any provenance gaps or discrepancies that require further verification. 

 The number of questions marks "?" (49) and "probably" (41) and "possibly" (30) and "might have" or "may have" (12) suggests the presence of guesswork and speculation.

Below are a few of the artworks known to have passed through Heinemann or Mont. 

Pinakos Inc joint owner network in the Knoedler files

Pinakos, owned by Rudolph Heinemann, is a name that pops up in Nazi-looted art and false provenances.

However, the Pinakos name has a tendency to be scrubbed from provenance records, replaced either by its owner, Heinemann, or, occasionally, its frequent partner, Knoedler.

This is a pity because while Heinemann and Knoedler operated over long periods of time, including long before WWII, Pinakos is a name that appears only at very specific times. (So specific that it can be used to date undated ledger entrees.)

Pinakos Inc is rarely found alone in the Knoedler ledgers. Usually it appears as a "joint owner". An interesting pattern is Pinakos as first a "joint owner" and then, without the other partner, a seller in a separate ledger entree.

Pinakos Inc often appears in leger entrees "carried forward". Some transactions involve exchanges or returns with several different Knoedler numbers.

This post examines "joint owners" which appear in the Knoedler ledgers together with Pinakos. 

Pinakos, Heinemann and Agnew

 The following is adapted from a "conversation" with Google's AI tool, NotebookLM based on sources uploaded.

Nazi looted art: deception by provenance authors

The scale of deceptive practices by art market professionals concerning Holocaust-related looted art is under-appreciated.

The web of complicity is tough to break through, and it is rather depressing to even try. 

However, inspired by recent events, we will in this next series of posts, attempt to highlight of few of the tricks used by various art market actors to disguise what they clearly suspect to be illicit origins.

In this first post, we revisit the El Greco, Portrait of a Gentleman, that was part of the Julius Priester collection before the Holocaust. 

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Pinakos, Heinemann, de Hauke in GPI Public Collections

The Getty Provenance Index maintains a database of artworks from public collections, some of which have provenances.

Additional Databases PUBLIC COLLECTION

Otto Wertheimer Galerie Les Tourettes

Otto Wertheimer was an art dealer who owned Galerie Les Tourettes.

(photo: Hercules and the Lion, Boston Museum of Fine Arts)

The (always informative) RKD says Otto Wertheimer was born about 1878 in Germany and died in 1972 or 73 in Paris. It lists 41 artworks (see below) that belonged to Wertheimer.

Zinckgraf (or Zinkgraf) as a Nazi Era Red Flag

The Zinckgraf name appears 55 times in the Linz (Hitler) collection database, usually with little or no information about the former  owner,  This portrait of a man ((Linz no 0408) by Moritz vonSchwind, was delivered to the notorious Maria Almas-Dietrich.

Friedrich Heinrich Zinckgraf ( 1878-1954), played an important role in the Aryanization of the Jewish-owned Galerie Heinemann and the transfer of Jewish art collections to Nazi officials and other collectors