RECENT RESEARCH

In the process of evaluating the collection, we noted that Rousseau's Banks of the Oise once belonged to Alphonse Kann, a well-known collector with homes in France and England. The painting was part of a large bequest by Maurice Wertheim, a Harvard alumnus who acquired most of his collection between 1936 and 1950. During the German occupation of France, Kann's collection was looted, and only incompletely restituted after the war.

Upon close examination of the painting, the curator discovered markings similar to those used by the ERR (Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, the commission charged with the organized expropriation of artwork from private collections) to identify the origin of confiscated works of art. Initial inquiries to the dealer who sold the painting to Wertheim did not provide any additional information about the source of the painting. We contacted the Kann family, and although they generously granted access to private family records housed in French government archives, we could not discover whether the painting had been confiscated or returned after the war's end.

Just recently, however, we located a bill of lading for the painting, documenting its shipment from Alphonse Kann to the dealer in 1948, shortly before it was sold to Wertheim. Although the whereabouts of the painting during the occupation remain uncertain, we are confident that by the immediate postwar period the painting was once again in the hands of its rightful owner.

Previous publications include: O'Brian, John. Degas to Matisse: the Maurice Wertheim Collection. New York: H.N. Abrams; [Cambridge, Mass.]: Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University Art Museums, 1988.