Art that Nazis stole in France now back to Jewish owners

PARIS, FRANCE — Four works of art looted in France by the Nazis during World War II have finally been returned to their Jewish owner's legal heirs, the culture ministry announced Wednesday.

The aquarelles and drawings by French 19th-century artists were seized in 1940 from Jewish-Egyptian businessman Moise Levi de Benzion, along with hundreds of other works.

The works were part of a major collection that he had assembled at his home in France, where he died in 1943, during the war.

For years the Louvre and Musee d'Orsay museums in Paris had custody of the works, by Georges Michel, Paul Delaroche, Auguste Hesse and Jules-Jacques Veyrassat.

The pack rides past the Louvre Pyramid inside the museum courtyard during the 21st and last stage of the 108th edition of the Tour de France cycling race, 108 km between Chatou and Paris Champs-Elysees, on July 18, 2021.

AFP/Yoan Valat, pool

They were part of a collection of 2,200 works being kept until the owners or their heirs could be traced.

In 2018, the then prime minister Edouard Philippe set up a special unit to try to track down the rightful owners of such works rather than waiting for them to come forward.

Until these four works were returned, only 169 such works of art had been restored to their owners since 1951 out of all those held by the French state.