UA painting by Austrian artist Gustav Klimt that was believed to have been missing for a hundred years is to be auctioned in Vienna. However, there are several questions to be clarified regarding ‘Bildnis Fräulein Lieser’ (‘Portrait of the Fräulein Lieser’, in free translation), the unfinished painting that Klimt began in 1917, a year before he died.
There are still debates about who the woman portrayed is and what happened to the painting during the Nazi era, says the BBC. Experts believe that it could be one of the daughters of Adolf or Justus Lieser, brothers from a wealthy family of Jewish industrialists.
Art historians Thomas Natter and Alfred Weidinger say the painting is by Margarethe Constance Lieser, daughter of Adolf Lieser. But the ‘im Kinsky’ auction house in Vienna, which is auctioning the artwork, suggests that the painting could also represent one of Justus Lieser’s two daughters or wife Henriette.
The fate of the piece after 1925, according to the auctioneer, is “unknown”. “What is known is that it was acquired by a legal ancestor of the owner in the 1960s and then came to the current owner through three consecutive inheritances”, they also said. The identity of the current owners has not been made public.
The painting is being sold on behalf of these owners and the legal successors of Adolf and Henriette Lieser, based on the Washington Principles – an international agreement to return art looted by the Nazis to the descendants of the people from whom the pieces were taken.
The value is estimated at 50 million euros, but it could reach a higher value. The auction should take place this Wednesday.
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