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- Title
Finance, Taxes and Provenance: A German Museum Acquisition of Chinese Antiquities in 1935.
- Authors
von zur Mühlen, Ilse
- Abstract
In 1935, the Bavarian State Ethnological Museum, now Museum Fünf Kontinente in Munich acquired several early Chinese objects at a series of sales held at the Berlin auction house of the Jewish art dealer Paul Graupe. The research results presented in this article are based on the findings that were initially prompted by a restitution claim for these objects. According to the title of the auction catalogue, the circumstances of the forthcoming sale appeared to be the liquidation of the stock of the firm Dr Otto Burchard & Co, Berlin, with Chinese art in catalogue volume I, offered on 22 and 23 March 1935 and a further section catalogued in volume II, offered on 29 April 1935. At the sale, the museum bid successfully on thirty-eight artefacts. In addition, two sculptures were donated to the museum after the Second World War which had been bought at the same sale by third parties. The need for investigation raised questions about the reasons that had prompted the auctions and the liquidation of the firm Dr Otto Burchard in the first place, and about the previous provenance of the Chinese objects. In the wider context of provenance research, the earlier history of the objects also had to be investigated. Extensive research covering museum documentation, a wide range of archival records and the assessment of a highly complex financial situation formed the basis for a new perspective on the potentially contentious circumstances of this acquisition.
- Subjects
DEUTSCHES Architekturmuseum; CHINESE antiquities; ETHNOLOGICAL museums &; collections; GRAUPE, Paul; BURCHARD, Otto
- Publication
Journal for Art Market Studies, 2018, Vol 2, Issue 3, p1
- ISSN
2511-7602
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.23690/jams.v2i3.75