Rosa Oppenheimer (; 31 July 1887 − 2 November 1943) was a

German Jewish The history of the Jews in Germany goes back at least to the year 321 CE, and continued through the Early Middle Ages (5th to 10th centuries CE) and High Middle Ages (c. 1000–1299 CE) when Jewish immigrants founded the Ashkenazi Jewish commu ...

art dealer An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art, or acts as the intermediary between the buyers and sellers of art. An art dealer in contemporary art typically seeks out various artists to represent, and builds relationsh ...

who was

murder Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification (jurisprudence), justification or valid excuse (legal), excuse committed with the necessary Intention (criminal law), intention as defined by the law in a specific jurisd ...

ed in the Holocaust. The art she owned together with her husband

Jacob Jacob, later known as Israel, is a Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions. He first appears in the Torah, where he is described in the Book of Genesis as a son of Isaac and Rebecca. Accordingly, alongside his older fraternal twin brother E ...

is the subject of several high-profile

restitution Restitution and unjust enrichment is the field of law relating to gains-based recovery. In contrast with damages (the law of compensation), restitution is a claim or remedy requiring a defendant to give up benefits wrongfully obtained. Liability ...

claims.

Early life

Rosa Silberstein was born on 31 July 1887 in Berlin and died in the Nazi concentration camp in Auschwitz on 2 November 1943. She married Jakob Oppenheimer and took his name. They worked together as art dealers.

Art dealership

Rosa's husband Jakob was the managing director of Margraf and Co, which was owned by Albert Loeske who died in 1929. Rosa and Jakob Oppenheimer worked for the Galerie Van Diemen, which was part of the Margraf group.

Financial difficulties

Loeske bequeathed his shares in Margraf and Co to the Oppenheimers upon his death in 1929, although a competing bequest left the entirety of Margraf's cash reserves to Rosa Beer (), Loeske's long-time companion. Loeske's will was unsuccessfully challenged by his blood relatives, a dispute which was not resolved until 1931. The bequest left the Oppenheimers with a substantial

inheritance tax International tax law distinguishes between an estate tax and an inheritance tax. An inheritance tax is a tax paid by a person who inherits money or property of a person who has died, whereas an estate tax is a levy on the estate (money and pro ...

debt of approximately ℛ︁ℳ︁ 5 million (). Additionally, German tax authorities had placed the Margraf group under investigation for tax evasion, following allegations that it had illegally sold trading stock through a Dutch subsidiary to evade German tax.

Nazi era, internment and death

In March 1933, following the Nazi rise to power, the Oppenheimers were summoned by the Gestapo for interrogation and fled to France. Jakob Oppenheimer retained control of Margraf for several years with the assistance of his son-in-law Ivan Bloch, a Swiss citizen, who was appointed managing director in May 1933. A court order was granted in December 1933 prohibiting Bloch and Jakob Oppenheimer from acting on behalf of Margraf. However, a 2015 report of the Spoliation Advisory Panel found that the court order "was a result of the continuing influence of Mr Oppenheimer, possibly to evade the inheritance tax debt levied by the German tax authorities" by distancing himself from the company. The Jacquier and Securius Bank acquired security over many of the Margraf group's assets, which were sold at auction in 1935 through Paul Graupe to repay the bank's loans and the Oppenheimers' inheritance tax debt. Jakob Oppenheimer died in France as an impoverished

refugee A refugee, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), is a person "forced to flee their own country and seek safety in another country. They are unable to return to their own country because of feared persecution as ...

in 1941. Rosa was

interned Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without Criminal charge, charges or Indictment, intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects ...

in at the Drancy camp in France, then deported and died in Auschwitz on 2 November 1943.

Restitution claims

The

heirs Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Official ...

of Jacob and Rosa Oppenheimer have filed several restitution claims for art seized by Nazis or relinquished in forced sales. In 2008 the Dutch Restitutions Committee recommended that artworks be returned to the Oppenheimer family, stating, "In the Committee's opinion, the applicants have sufficiently shown that the work of art was auctioned at a forced auction set up by the Nazi authorities to implement anti-Jewish measures and the Committee therefore adjudges that it can be considered involuntary loss of possession as a result of circumstances directly related to the Nazi regime." In 2009, following years of investigation two

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

paintings that had been in a forced sale in 1935 were restituted by the

Hearst Castle Hearst Castle, known formally as La Cuesta Encantada ( Spanish for "The Enchanted Hill"), is a historic estate in San Simeon, located on the Central Coast of California. Conceived by William Randolph Hearst, the publishing tycoon, and his arc ...

which said that Hearst was not aware of their origins when he acquired them from I.S. Goldschmidt Gallery in Berlin. In 2011, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston reached an agreement with the Oppenheimer family concerning a settlement for

tapestries Tapestry is a form of textile art which was traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Normally it is used to create images rather than patterns. Tapestry is relatively fragile, and difficult to make, so most historical pieces are intended to han ...

that had been the object of a

forced sale A partition is a term used in the law of real property to describe an act, by a court order or otherwise, to divide up a concurrent estate into separate portions representing the proportionate interests of the owners of property. It is sometimes ...

. Also in 2011 the

Landesmuseum Württemberg The Landesmuseum Württemberg (Württemberg State Museum) is the main historical museum of the Württemberg part of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It emerged from the 16th-century “Kunstkammer” ( Cabinet of art and curios ...

in Stuttgart, Germany restituted to the Oppenheimer heirs a 16th-century wooden sculpture of St. John the Baptist that had been looted by Nazis in 1933, then auctioned off to Heinemann and Dr. Benno Griesbert. In 2017 the heirs demanded the restitution of two paintings which were at the

National Gallery of Ireland The National Gallery of Ireland () houses the national collection of Irish and European art. It is located in the centre of Dublin with one entrance on Merrion Square, beside Leinster House, and another on Clare Street, Dublin, Clare Street. It ...

which refused the claim based on the research of a

provenance Provenance () is the chronology of the ownership, custody or location of a historical object. The term was originally mostly used in relation to works of art, but is now used in similar senses in a wide range of fields, including archaeology, p ...

expert

Early life

Art dealership

Financial difficulties

Nazi era, internment and death

Restitution claims

References

Further reading