(Paris) Two paintings by Auguste Renoir and Alfred Sisley, returned in May to the heirs of a Jewish gallery owner, Grégoire Schusterman, who was looted during the Nazi Occupation, will be auctioned at Sotheby’s in Paris on October 18, the auction house announced on Monday.
First of all, it is about the Caryatids by Renoir, depicting two nude women in an Art Deco style, painted in 1909 and acquired at auction by the gallery owner in 1939. It is estimated at 1 to 1.5 million euros, according to Sotheby’s.
The second painting, titled The Bargeswas painted in 1870 by the French-born British painter Alfred Sisley and depicts a Normandy port with barges moored. It is estimated at €800,000 to €1.2 million.
The two works, which many rights holders wanted to put up for sale in this year of the anniversary of the Impressionist movement, will be exhibited to the public before the sale from October 12 at Sotheby’s.
After World War II, the Caryatids were recovered by the Allies at Thalhausen Castle in Bavaria, The Barges in the Rhineland.
Repatriated to France, the paintings were selected in 1950 from among the last 15,000 works returned from Germany and not returned; they became “National Recovery Museums” (MNR) works.
The two paintings, returned to the gallery owner’s heirs on May 16 during an official ceremony at the Ministry of Culture, had been on deposit in two French museums since the end of the war.