Alphonse Kann (14 March 1870 in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

– 1948 in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

) was a prominent French art collector of

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

heritage. He was a childhood playmate and adult friend of the writer

Marcel Proust Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust ( ; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, literary critic, and essayist who wrote the novel (in French – translated in English as ''Remembrance of Things Past'' and more r ...

, who incorporated several of Kann's features into the character Charles Swann (in '' Swann in Love'').Feliciano, Hector. ''The Lost Museum: The Nazi Conspiracy to Steal the World's Greatest Art'', Basic Books, 1997, p. 111.

Art collector

The name Kann, written with double "nn", was said in Paris to be "le plus chic du chic". Known for his discerning taste and shrewd collecting instincts, Kann shocked the art world in 1927 by auctioning off (at the American Art Association, New York City) most of his

Old Master In art history, "Old Master" (or "old master")Old Masters De ...

collection (including works by Bruegel,

Cimabue Giovanni Cimabue ( , ; – 1302), Translated with an introduction and notes by J.C. and P Bondanella. Oxford: Oxford University Press (Oxford World's Classics), 1991, pp. 7–14. . also known as Cenni di Pepo or Cenni di Pepi, was an Italian p ...

, Fragonard, Pollaiuolo,

Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens ( ; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens' highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of clas ...

and

Tintoretto Jacopo Robusti (late September or early October 1518Bernari and de Vecchi 1970, p. 83.31 May 1594), best known as Tintoretto ( ; , ), was an Italian Renaissance painter of the Venetian school. His contemporaries both admired and criticized th ...

) in order to concentrate on the acquisition of 19th-century and modern art, which he collected vigorously over the following decade.

Nazi theft

Kann left France for England in 1938 without making an inventory of his eclectic art collection, which was kept in a St.-Germain-en-Laye mansion and subsequently looted in October 1940 by Nazi occupiers. Included in the plunder were 1,400 paintings, sculptures and art objects, which were first taken to the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...

and then to the

Jeu de Paume ''Jeu de paume'' (, ; originally spelled ; ), nowadays known as real tennis, (US) court tennis or (in France) ''courte paume'', is a ball-and-court game that originated in France. It was an indoor precursor of tennis played without racquets, ...

. There they were inventoried by the Nazi art looting organization known as the

Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce The Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce ( or ''ERR'') was a Nazi Party organization dedicated to appropriating cultural property during the Second World War. It was led by the chief ideologue of the Nazi Party, Alfred Rosenberg, from within the NSD ...

or ERR. Some of the objects were then taken to Germany or Austria. Kann recovered only a small fraction of his large collection before his death in England in 1948. Although he did not live to see a copy, the Nazi inventory of Kann's art collection ran to 60 typed pages. Decades after the war, several paintings from Kann's collection were discovered in prominent European and U.S. museums. "Smoke Over Rooftops," a 1911 painting by

Fernand Léger Joseph Fernand Henri Léger (; February 4, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was a French painting, painter, sculpture, sculptor, and film director, filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism (known as "tubism") which he gradually ...

, was returned in October 2008 to Kann's heirs by the

Minneapolis Institute of Arts The Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) is an arts museum located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. Home to more than 90,000 works of art representing 5,000 years of world history, Mia is one of the largest art museums in the United Stat ...

after an eleven-year investigation. In the 1990s, eight antique manuscripts once owned by Kann turned up in the vaults of Wildenstein & Company, still bearing the distinctive Nazi catalog numbers ("KA 879" to "KA 886", in red pencil) likely made by

Bruno Lohse Wilhelm Peter Bruno Lohse (17 September 1911 – 19 March 2007) was a German art dealer and SS-Hauptsturmführer who, during World War II, became the chief art looter in Paris for Hermann Göring, helping the Nazi leader amass a vast collection ...

as he processed the Kann collection in the

. The discovery of the missing manuscripts prompted a lawsuit by Kann's heirs against Wildenstein & Company.

References

External links

*
Warin v Wildenstein & Co., Inc
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kann, Alphonse 1870 births 1948 deaths French art collectors Jewish art collectors 19th-century Austrian Jews Subjects of Nazi art appropriations Emigrants from Austria-Hungary to France French emigrants to the United Kingdom