WEBVTT - Hedwig’s Lost Van Gogh 0:00:15.356 --> 0:00:25.796 Pushkin in March of eighteen eighty six. Vincent then go 0:00:26.036 --> 0:00:29.036 move from Antwerp to Paris to live with his brother 0:00:29.156 --> 0:00:31.116 Theo in montmart. 0:00:31.116 --> 0:00:35.076 He very soon became befriended with some of the other 0:00:35.196 --> 0:00:39.756 artists living there who would become very famous within the 0:00:39.796 --> 0:00:44.556 next decades, like, for example, Paul Signac On Reader to 0:00:44.636 --> 0:00:48.556 Lose Lutrech, Emil Bernard and some others, and he learned 0:00:48.556 --> 0:00:49.636 a lot from. 0:00:49.436 --> 0:00:52.876 Them, Stefan Koldorff German art. 0:00:52.716 --> 0:00:57.716 Expert, and that led to his willingness to make experiments 0:00:57.716 --> 0:01:01.516 in becoming an artist. When he painted in rather dark 0:01:01.756 --> 0:01:06.036 brownish grayish tones during his time before in the Netherlands, 0:01:06.476 --> 0:01:08.876 he now was willing to try out what to do 0:01:08.916 --> 0:01:11.716 with color, how to form things with color. 0:01:12.276 --> 0:01:15.996 In Vengo's effort to master oil painting, he painted still lives, 0:01:16.396 --> 0:01:20.076 mostly flowers he couldn't afford models. In a space of 0:01:20.116 --> 0:01:23.596 a few years, he produced dozens and dozens of paintings. 0:01:23.916 --> 0:01:27.236 The Paris period means that van Goch just had decided 0:01:27.636 --> 0:01:30.476 to become an artist. He no longer wanted to try 0:01:30.556 --> 0:01:34.156 other professions like he did before, like being a preacher 0:01:34.396 --> 0:01:37.916 or a teacher, or helping people. He now made the 0:01:37.916 --> 0:01:40.076 decision I want to be a painter, and he knew 0:01:40.116 --> 0:01:41.956 that Paris is the place to be. 0:01:44.316 --> 0:01:47.436 My name is Malcolm Gladwell. You're listening to Revisionist History, 0:01:47.756 --> 0:01:56.276 my podcast about things Overlooked and misunderstood. This episode is 0:01:56.316 --> 0:01:59.876 a continuation of my investigation into the hoarding habits of 0:01:59.996 --> 0:02:03.916 art museums. It's about one of those dozens of still lives. 0:02:03.996 --> 0:02:08.516 Vang painted in his Paris period, a small canvas seventeen 0:02:08.556 --> 0:02:15.116 inches by fourteen inches, vas with carnations. That little painting, 0:02:15.276 --> 0:02:26.236 it turns out, has a strange and troubled history. Vengo 0:02:26.356 --> 0:02:29.636 painted vas with carnations right after his arrival in Paris. 0:02:30.196 --> 0:02:33.196 At some point after his death four years later, it 0:02:33.276 --> 0:02:35.236 was acquired by a wealthy German couple. 0:02:35.596 --> 0:02:40.156 Had Uhlmann and her husband Abert Ulman were one of 0:02:40.196 --> 0:02:45.916 the most important art collector couples in Frankfurt in Western Germany. 0:02:47.356 --> 0:02:52.596 They made their money out of business. They very early 0:02:52.676 --> 0:02:57.156 decided to invest money in works of art which were 0:02:57.196 --> 0:03:01.476 not commonly regarded as very important works. So they were 0:03:01.716 --> 0:03:04.956 very daring collectors, and that shows that it was not 0:03:04.996 --> 0:03:08.156 only investment, it was also the love of art which 0:03:08.276 --> 0:03:12.236 led them to buying works, for example, by Fangoch, but 0:03:12.356 --> 0:03:15.156 also by several Impressionist painters. 0:03:15.756 --> 0:03:19.316 Headwick Ohman sold Vas with Carnations on consignment to an 0:03:19.436 --> 0:03:21.596 art dealer who took it back to New York just 0:03:21.636 --> 0:03:25.396 before the Second World War. That dealer, in turn sold 0:03:25.396 --> 0:03:28.356 it to William Getz, one of the most powerful producers 0:03:28.356 --> 0:03:33.956 in Hollywood. Getz and his wife Edith, daughter of the 0:03:34.036 --> 0:03:37.036 legendary Louis B. Mayer, had one of the greatest private 0:03:37.036 --> 0:03:39.356 collections of Impressionist art in the world. 0:03:39.676 --> 0:03:43.276 My grandmother was called the Hostess of Hollywood, and she 0:03:44.516 --> 0:03:48.996 spent her entire life hosting lavish dinner parties people the 0:03:49.196 --> 0:03:53.476 likes of Laurence Olivier and Trim Caa PODi and Jil Brenner. 0:03:53.716 --> 0:03:56.156 That's gets his granddaughter, Victoria Bleden. 0:03:56.756 --> 0:03:58.956 I mean, I had dinner with Laurence Olivier when I 0:03:58.956 --> 0:04:01.716 was six years old. You know, I'd be sitting amongst 0:04:01.756 --> 0:04:04.956 the fans and latour and the dagga and the manna, 0:04:05.236 --> 0:04:08.436 and this is this is this is our childhood. You know, 0:04:08.476 --> 0:04:11.836 finger bowl, the whole nine yards, and then they would 0:04:11.876 --> 0:04:14.956 have movies in the living room. And in the living room, 0:04:15.516 --> 0:04:17.476 perhaps you've seen any pictures of it. But I mean, 0:04:17.476 --> 0:04:21.076 this is where the money, the blue Picasso, the other 0:04:21.116 --> 0:04:23.956 Picasso which she had, a harlequin it was called, and 0:04:24.036 --> 0:04:25.396 all these things through on the wall, and all of 0:04:25.396 --> 0:04:27.236 a sudden we sit in the dive in the living room, 0:04:27.236 --> 0:04:30.356 and all the couches and everything, and a painting would 0:04:30.356 --> 0:04:32.396 come up and the screen would come down, and then 0:04:32.436 --> 0:04:35.596 we'd watched movies kind of for our child. 0:04:35.516 --> 0:04:39.076 Is the priceless art would disappear into the ceiling and 0:04:39.156 --> 0:04:41.596 a movie screen would descend in its place. If that 0:04:41.676 --> 0:04:44.396 isn't the greatest metaphor for Hollywood, I don't know what is. 0:04:46.956 --> 0:04:50.076 In nineteen fifty six, Kirk Douglas started a movie about 0:04:50.156 --> 0:04:53.476 van Go called Lust for Life. 0:04:54.396 --> 0:04:57.476 Few people know the real story of this intense, strong 0:04:57.556 --> 0:05:01.476 willed man. Now his tumultuous career is revealed for the 0:05:01.516 --> 0:05:04.996 first time with frankness and intimacy, with all that. 0:05:05.076 --> 0:05:06.756 If you look at the corner of the movie poster 0:05:06.916 --> 0:05:11.116 for Lust for Life, there it is Carnations. But by 0:05:11.156 --> 0:05:13.676 then Getz it sold it. He didn't hang on to 0:05:13.756 --> 0:05:15.676 his van Go the way he did his other treasures. 0:05:15.996 --> 0:05:19.076 It wasn't for him. The painting passed to the heiress 0:05:19.116 --> 0:05:22.876 to the Kmart fortune, Katherine Kresgi, who among other things, 0:05:23.116 --> 0:05:26.356 was once married to a Swedish baron. She convinced him 0:05:26.396 --> 0:05:28.516 to leave London and come live with her in her 0:05:28.596 --> 0:05:33.876 native Detroit. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Swedish baron's order for miss 0:05:33.956 --> 0:05:38.036 Gresgy did not survive the move to Michigan. When Kresgi 0:05:38.156 --> 0:05:41.156 died in nineteen ninety, she willed vaz with carnations to 0:05:41.196 --> 0:05:44.796 the Detroit Institute of Art. She gave it without restriction, 0:05:45.156 --> 0:05:47.716 meaning the di Ia as it's known, could do with 0:05:47.836 --> 0:05:50.756 it what they wanted, sell it, trade it. They didn't 0:05:50.796 --> 0:05:54.076 have to make it part of their permanent collection. Kresgy 0:05:54.276 --> 0:05:57.196 clearly didn't care any more for the painting than Getz did, 0:05:58.036 --> 0:06:00.596 and neither did the di Ia. They put it in 0:06:00.676 --> 0:06:04.516 her basement for twenty years. Vincent van Go painted many 0:06:04.636 --> 0:06:07.836 remarkable canvasses. This is not one of them. 0:06:07.996 --> 0:06:11.956 He also painted larger flower still lives in Paris, but 0:06:12.036 --> 0:06:16.436 this is a smaller one. Thus kind of canvas which 0:06:16.476 --> 0:06:18.996 I think was not meant for sale or as a 0:06:19.036 --> 0:06:23.916 present for acquaintances or girlfriends or his models or so. 0:06:24.356 --> 0:06:26.196 It was just for trying out things. 0:06:26.796 --> 0:06:30.756 Our experts like to damn with faint praise. Vaz with 0:06:30.876 --> 0:06:33.036 Carnations gets a lot of faint praise. 0:06:33.636 --> 0:06:37.716 It's very nice, it's very profound, but it's not a 0:06:37.916 --> 0:06:45.196 very well spectacular composition or color combination. It's just a 0:06:45.276 --> 0:06:47.476 kind of let me try out what happens if I 0:06:47.516 --> 0:06:50.076 do this, if I do this, and so it's a 0:06:50.196 --> 0:06:52.156 nice but not really an important work. 0:06:53.156 --> 0:06:56.196 The current head of the Detroit Institute of Art, Salvador 0:06:56.316 --> 0:06:59.716 Cellar Ponds, says, the problem is that Viz with Carnations 0:07:00.196 --> 0:07:02.716 just doesn't look like a van Go. When you say 0:07:02.716 --> 0:07:05.036 it doesn't look like a van Go, what. 0:07:04.916 --> 0:07:05.396 Do you mean? 0:07:05.476 --> 0:07:07.076 Does it look like the sunflowers? 0:07:07.716 --> 0:07:09.556 Yeah? 0:07:09.676 --> 0:07:13.396 I mean it's not a typical work like you would 0:07:13.716 --> 0:07:19.636 like the self portrait or the works that he did 0:07:19.756 --> 0:07:21.876 when he was in the south of France. Those are 0:07:21.916 --> 0:07:27.916 the most famous works that the general public knows Bangou did. 0:07:28.556 --> 0:07:30.836 Then there's the fact that the painting had a stamp 0:07:30.876 --> 0:07:33.596 on the back, a sign that it was painted on 0:07:33.676 --> 0:07:37.436 a fancy bit of stretch canvas. Then Go in his 0:07:37.556 --> 0:07:42.036 Parisiers was broke. What was he doing with a fancy canvas? 0:07:42.796 --> 0:07:46.796 It took years to resolve that particular discrepancy and In 0:07:46.836 --> 0:07:49.876 the meantime, lots of people began to think vuzz with 0:07:49.956 --> 0:07:51.636 carnations was a fake. 0:07:52.276 --> 0:07:58.236 Later we discovered that that canvas with the stap on 0:07:58.316 --> 0:08:01.196 the back was not actually part of the work. It 0:08:01.276 --> 0:08:05.476 was added later. So you had the original canvas, then 0:08:05.516 --> 0:08:09.276 you have a lightning canvas glued to the original canvas, 0:08:09.316 --> 0:08:12.596 and then you had the third canvas with a stencil 0:08:12.676 --> 0:08:15.796 or a stamp on the back. So once we removed that, 0:08:16.196 --> 0:08:18.836 we understood that was not part of the original work. 0:08:21.116 --> 0:08:23.716 So here we have a van Go that does not 0:08:23.796 --> 0:08:27.516 look like a van Go, that was never intended to 0:08:27.556 --> 0:08:31.196 be sold or shown or even given away, that a 0:08:31.276 --> 0:08:34.396 German couple bought somewhere around the turn of the century 0:08:34.916 --> 0:08:37.356 and then sold that turned up in the home of 0:08:37.396 --> 0:08:40.276 a Hollywood mogul and served as a prop in a 0:08:40.356 --> 0:08:44.516 Kirk Douglas movie poster, then finally landed in Detroit with 0:08:44.596 --> 0:08:47.636 a Kmart heiress who threw it in as an afterthought 0:08:47.876 --> 0:08:51.796 when she made her bequest to the Dia, whereupon the 0:08:51.836 --> 0:08:55.636 painting languished in a cellar for a quarter century because 0:08:55.676 --> 0:08:58.516 of a dubious bit of canvas glued to the back. 0:08:59.636 --> 0:09:01.676 What's your personal feeling about this painting. 0:09:02.276 --> 0:09:02.956 Do you like it? 0:09:02.996 --> 0:09:03.796 Are you drawn to it? 0:09:10.836 --> 0:09:13.676 I like it because I have a personal story connected 0:09:13.716 --> 0:09:15.876 to it. You know, when I came to the museum, 0:09:15.956 --> 0:09:20.116 the painting was in storage as an attributed painting by 0:09:20.196 --> 0:09:25.236 Vangal with basically no value. I was able to bring 0:09:25.276 --> 0:09:27.396 it up to the galleries and put it together with 0:09:27.436 --> 0:09:31.036 the other four bangals that the DIA has a word 0:09:31.116 --> 0:09:33.676 that it looks like a painting by a Sunday painter, 0:09:35.116 --> 0:09:39.956 as considered by a forger, would have no value, no 0:09:40.076 --> 0:09:44.116 monetary value. But the minute we consider it as by Vango, 0:09:44.356 --> 0:09:49.636 it has a value of several million dollars. However, the 0:09:49.676 --> 0:09:53.236 painting has not changed. The painting continues to be what 0:09:53.356 --> 0:09:57.516 it is. What has changed is the perception that we 0:09:57.636 --> 0:10:00.356 have on the painting, and that is a really interesting 0:10:00.476 --> 0:10:04.676 concept to think about. So I like the painting a 0:10:04.676 --> 0:10:05.236 lot for that. 0:10:05.676 --> 0:10:06.396 Yeah. 0:10:06.516 --> 0:10:08.956 But if someone said to you, when you retire as 0:10:08.996 --> 0:10:11.116 to directory, you can take one of the DIA's van 0:10:11.196 --> 0:10:13.316 goes with you, which one would you take? 0:10:13.996 --> 0:10:14.876 Not this one? No? 0:10:18.036 --> 0:10:20.596 So why should we care about Vaz with carnations. 0:10:21.116 --> 0:10:22.036 We shouldn't. 0:10:22.276 --> 0:10:25.436 It's not the painting that matters. The painting is just 0:10:25.476 --> 0:10:33.636 a mcguffin. In case you don't know what I mean 0:10:33.676 --> 0:10:37.876 by mcguffin, let's consult The Dick Cavett Show, nineteen seventy two. 0:10:38.676 --> 0:10:42.556 Cavit's guest is the legendary film director Alfred Hitchcock, the 0:10:42.596 --> 0:10:45.316 great proponent of mcguffin's. 0:10:48.516 --> 0:10:49.676 Can explain what a mcguffin. 0:10:49.796 --> 0:10:54.756 Yes, a mcguffin you see in most films about spies. 0:10:55.916 --> 0:10:59.956 It is a thing that the spies are after. In 0:10:59.996 --> 0:11:03.716 the days of Roger Kipling, it will be the plans 0:11:03.796 --> 0:11:08.916 of the fort on the Kaiber Pass. It would be 0:11:08.956 --> 0:11:14.276 the plans of an airplane engine, and the plans of 0:11:14.356 --> 0:11:18.356 an anthem bomb, anything you like. It's always called the 0:11:18.396 --> 0:11:22.476 thing that the characters on the screen worry about, but 0:11:22.556 --> 0:11:23.756 the audience don't care. 0:11:25.356 --> 0:11:28.196 The mcguffin is an object used to propel the plot, 0:11:28.476 --> 0:11:32.156 to motivate the characters, but which has no intrinsic value 0:11:32.396 --> 0:11:36.476 to anyone else. VARs with carnations is a mcguffin. 0:11:36.956 --> 0:11:40.836 It's described in a scene in an English train going 0:11:40.876 --> 0:11:45.116 to Scotland, and one man says to the other opposite him, 0:11:45.156 --> 0:11:48.996 he said, what's that package above your head there? Now? 0:11:49.036 --> 0:11:52.036 The man said, oh, that that's a mcguffin. He said, 0:11:52.156 --> 0:11:56.556 What is a mcguffin. He said, well, it's an apparatus 0:11:56.596 --> 0:12:03.156 for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands. Man said, but 0:12:03.196 --> 0:12:06.596 there are no lions in the Scottish Islands. He said, 0:12:06.596 --> 0:12:07.996 then that's no mcguffin. 0:12:12.116 --> 0:12:14.116 I thank you for clearing that up for us. 0:12:16.156 --> 0:12:21.036 I repeat, it's not the painting that matters. That has 0:12:21.156 --> 0:12:23.516 always been the mistake with the way people have thought 0:12:23.516 --> 0:12:29.476 about Vozwi carnations. No more mcguffins. After the break, let's 0:12:29.476 --> 0:12:30.716 start this story again. 0:12:41.036 --> 0:12:45.156 Let's just talk about your family. Your great grandmother is 0:12:45.516 --> 0:12:46.476 Hedwig Ulmen. 0:12:47.316 --> 0:12:48.436 Yes, that's correct. 0:12:48.516 --> 0:12:51.596 Yes, she came from a family who had for a 0:12:51.796 --> 0:12:55.676 very long time lived in Frankfurt. You know, many relatives, 0:12:56.476 --> 0:12:58.076 very embedded history in the city. 0:12:58.636 --> 0:13:02.396 I'm talking with Sophie Allen. She lives in Melbourne. Her 0:13:02.396 --> 0:13:06.716 great grandmother was Hedwig Ulmen, the first known owner of 0:13:06.716 --> 0:13:12.956 Ozwi carnations. Hedwig was born in eighteen seventy two into 0:13:12.956 --> 0:13:17.116 a wealthy family in Germany, married Albert Ohlmann, lived with 0:13:17.196 --> 0:13:20.876 him in a grand residence called the Villa Gerlock in Frankfurt, 0:13:21.276 --> 0:13:23.796 and together built an extraordinary art collection. 0:13:25.436 --> 0:13:29.316 So she collected with a great passion medieval sculpture. 0:13:29.916 --> 0:13:31.436 That was a huge passion of hers. 0:13:31.756 --> 0:13:38.236 She collected porcelain, she collected silver, and I believe she 0:13:38.236 --> 0:13:42.956 had different rooms for each of these passions in her home. 0:13:43.876 --> 0:13:48.036 Hedwig and Albert had two sons and many grandchildren, one 0:13:48.076 --> 0:13:50.556 of whom was named Claude. Sophie's father. 0:13:51.036 --> 0:13:52.796 Now, did he remember Hedwig? 0:13:53.116 --> 0:13:58.556 Oh, he was so attached to Hedwig. He was I 0:13:58.636 --> 0:14:02.036 think the favorite, and she was his favorite. He always 0:14:02.036 --> 0:14:04.796 spoke of her really fondly, and I think he felt 0:14:05.116 --> 0:14:06.716 that was probably the person he loved the most. 0:14:07.116 --> 0:14:08.956 Did he talk about what she was like. 0:14:09.676 --> 0:14:10.996 Yes, a little bit. 0:14:11.076 --> 0:14:13.356 Yeah, I mean from what he could remember as a 0:14:13.396 --> 0:14:21.716 young boy, very warm and loving and quite gentle, incredibly 0:14:21.716 --> 0:14:22.876 interested in the arts. 0:14:23.196 --> 0:14:25.996 But the life of Claude's grandparents took a sudden turn 0:14:26.596 --> 0:14:28.756 because the Almonds were Jewish. 0:14:29.396 --> 0:14:32.476 Frankfort was already starting to change in by nineteen thirty three, 0:14:32.836 --> 0:14:36.116 and I'm not sure exactly what date, but I know 0:14:36.196 --> 0:14:38.316 that going to the opera became an issue. If you 0:14:38.356 --> 0:14:42.236 had a Jewish heritage, you couldn't. There was a stage 0:14:42.236 --> 0:14:43.516 where you couldn't go to the opera, and that was 0:14:43.556 --> 0:14:45.556 something that Hedvig did constantly. 0:14:45.596 --> 0:14:49.236 She lived around the corner from the opera house. You know, 0:14:49.276 --> 0:14:51.596 her lifestyle started to change, and so did my grandparents. 0:14:52.196 --> 0:14:52.796 So they left. 0:14:52.876 --> 0:14:57.236 They left first, and Hedvig didn't come to Milan till right, 0:14:57.756 --> 0:15:00.036 you know, maybe within six months or the last six 0:15:00.076 --> 0:15:00.876 months that they were there. 0:15:01.996 --> 0:15:03.596 She's going to be a lot of what year thirty 0:15:03.596 --> 0:15:05.316 eight or thirty nine, what year do you know? 0:15:05.716 --> 0:15:07.116 I think it was that right at the end of 0:15:07.236 --> 0:15:08.196 nineteen thirty eight. 0:15:09.116 --> 0:15:12.236 The end of nineteen thirty eight was, of course, Crystal Knocked, 0:15:12.636 --> 0:15:16.676 the Night of Broken Glass, when at Hitler's direction, mobs 0:15:16.716 --> 0:15:20.876 destroyed hundreds of synagogues and yeshivas across Germany. It was 0:15:20.956 --> 0:15:24.276 impossible to be a German Jew. After Crystal Knocked and 0:15:24.396 --> 0:15:27.676 imagined that you were safe. Hadwig sold off as much 0:15:27.716 --> 0:15:30.476 of her art collection as she could. She fled to 0:15:30.516 --> 0:15:34.276 Milan to join her sons. Then the intentions of Mussolini 0:15:34.316 --> 0:15:37.876 towards Jews became clear, and the whole family fled again, 0:15:38.756 --> 0:15:40.156 this time to Australia. 0:15:41.036 --> 0:15:43.556 So they got out in. 0:15:43.476 --> 0:15:47.076 The neck of time, yes they did, and they go 0:15:47.196 --> 0:15:49.956 via the Panama Canal. I remember my father, I don't 0:15:49.996 --> 0:15:51.876 know how on earth he could have remembered that because 0:15:51.916 --> 0:15:54.636 he was under two years of age, But I think 0:15:54.636 --> 0:15:56.836 it was about a six week trip and the two 0:15:56.876 --> 0:16:00.876 brothers with their families. They both had two children each, 0:16:01.196 --> 0:16:04.436 and hedvig As as the matriarch. They brought her or 0:16:04.836 --> 0:16:06.716 so there were nine of them. 0:16:07.316 --> 0:16:10.996 They made it to Melbourne change their last names Allman 0:16:11.396 --> 0:16:15.356 became Olan and in May of nineteen forty five, four 0:16:15.436 --> 0:16:18.156 days before the end of the war, Hedwick died. 0:16:18.996 --> 0:16:21.996 My father and my uncle probably spent most of their 0:16:22.036 --> 0:16:28.116 lives just assimilating and embracing the life they had, and 0:16:28.156 --> 0:16:30.676 I think bearing the sadness as much as they could, 0:16:30.676 --> 0:16:32.316 because there's definitely. 0:16:33.636 --> 0:16:34.156 A sadness. 0:16:34.156 --> 0:16:37.316 There's gratitude and there's sadness. They go they kind of 0:16:37.316 --> 0:16:41.556 almost they go along together in our life and it's 0:16:41.596 --> 0:16:43.716 come through to my generation too in a way. 0:16:43.796 --> 0:16:46.236 Yeah. 0:16:46.676 --> 0:16:50.436 Then late in his life, Claude Ollen decided to revisit 0:16:50.476 --> 0:16:54.116 the family's past to find the family's art collection that 0:16:54.196 --> 0:16:57.636 had been lost in the desperate escape from Germany. What 0:16:57.676 --> 0:17:00.276 do you think motivated him, what was his How would 0:17:00.276 --> 0:17:02.876 he have expressed his desire to pursue his. 0:17:02.876 --> 0:17:09.036 Claims without sounding dramatic It's just I know that my father, 0:17:09.516 --> 0:17:14.556 all throughout his life, to some degree, maybe within his 0:17:14.636 --> 0:17:18.916 psyche or he struggled with the fact that the family 0:17:19.516 --> 0:17:22.076 had had to leave Europe. It was like a baseline 0:17:22.156 --> 0:17:28.956 in his life that there'd been this massive disruption, and 0:17:31.356 --> 0:17:32.596 it just carried this sense of loss. 0:17:32.636 --> 0:17:34.796 It started. It would have started with the loss of Headvig. 0:17:35.356 --> 0:17:37.676 That would be the first loss he could understand, because 0:17:37.676 --> 0:17:39.876 it was a loved grandmother, the one who gave him, 0:17:39.956 --> 0:17:43.156 who doated on him. From the stories, I thought he 0:17:43.276 --> 0:17:47.716 was the bee's knees, and he was closer to to 0:17:47.756 --> 0:17:49.236 Headvig than he was to his own mother. 0:17:50.356 --> 0:17:54.236 So Claude Allen sat down and went through his grandmother's papers, 0:17:54.556 --> 0:17:57.556 trying to reconstruct what artworks she and her family had 0:17:57.556 --> 0:18:00.076 owned in the years before the war and where they 0:18:00.076 --> 0:18:03.476 had ended up. Some of the works had vanished, others 0:18:03.596 --> 0:18:05.956 were in plain sight. You can find a few for 0:18:06.036 --> 0:18:09.356 yourself if you spend a few hours poking around the internet. 0:18:09.796 --> 0:18:12.396 There's a Paul Gogen sold by Hedwig's sister in law 0:18:12.476 --> 0:18:16.396 in nineteen thirty eight as she too fled Frankfort. That 0:18:16.476 --> 0:18:19.396 painting ended up at the Toledo Museum of art in Ohio. 0:18:20.036 --> 0:18:22.516 The family had sold the Gogen along with a lovely 0:18:22.596 --> 0:18:25.596 van Go called the Diggers. The Diggers ended up in 0:18:25.636 --> 0:18:28.676 the hands of a department store air, who then gave 0:18:28.716 --> 0:18:30.676 it to the Detroit Institute of Art in the late 0:18:30.756 --> 0:18:34.676 nineteen sixties. There's a Virgin and Child by Lucas Kronoch 0:18:34.756 --> 0:18:38.316 the Elder from the sixteenth century, now in the University 0:18:38.356 --> 0:18:41.356 of Arizona Museum of Art. Then there were the four 0:18:41.396 --> 0:18:45.116 beautiful wall panels in Hedwig's dining room by the prominent 0:18:45.156 --> 0:18:51.596 German landscape painter Hans Toma Spring, summer, winter, fall. Claude 0:18:51.676 --> 0:18:54.756 Ullen couldn't find out where any of those had gone. 0:18:55.196 --> 0:18:59.396 And finally there was the small, modest still life acquired 0:18:59.436 --> 0:19:02.196 by Hedwig and her husband back in the heyday of 0:19:02.236 --> 0:19:08.236 their collecting, Vozwi Carnations Vincent Vengo, eighteen eighty six. 0:19:13.036 --> 0:19:16.556 I wasn't alive during Hedwig's lifetime. I wasn't even born. 0:19:16.556 --> 0:19:18.556 I wasn't born for another quarter of a century even more. 0:19:18.916 --> 0:19:22.596 But she was very much a part of our lives, 0:19:22.676 --> 0:19:26.876 which was talked about constantly and very fondly, and her 0:19:26.916 --> 0:19:28.836 life was all around us in some way. 0:19:29.516 --> 0:19:34.196 As Claude Ollen began his investigation into Hedwig's last art collections. 0:19:34.836 --> 0:19:37.556 Other Holocaust survivors and her families started to do the 0:19:37.596 --> 0:19:42.956 same thing. There were conferences, laws passed. Europe in particular 0:19:43.276 --> 0:19:46.156 had a growing movement to reconsider the status of art 0:19:46.276 --> 0:19:48.956 sold lost or confiscated during the. 0:19:48.916 --> 0:19:51.836 War, and it seemed that the world was changing and 0:19:51.836 --> 0:19:56.556 a restitution might be possible. My father was very excited 0:19:56.676 --> 0:19:59.916 and hopeful, deeply hopeful about it, whilst I had a 0:20:00.036 --> 0:20:00.996 very different reaction. 0:20:01.796 --> 0:20:03.196 I was a young adult at the time. 0:20:03.676 --> 0:20:07.116 I was almost sort of like, I don't let's don't 0:20:07.116 --> 0:20:08.756 get your hopes up, don't go there. 0:20:09.196 --> 0:20:12.196 It's just going to bring up I think it's because 0:20:12.196 --> 0:20:13.156 I thought it was going to bring. 0:20:13.076 --> 0:20:17.276 Up all these feelings that I knew were down there, 0:20:17.276 --> 0:20:18.436 but I didn't know what they were. 0:20:18.516 --> 0:20:20.236 And it's very it's. 0:20:20.076 --> 0:20:23.716 Actually for someone whose third generation is still very confronting, 0:20:23.756 --> 0:20:28.196 and that's actually surprises me, and still it continues to 0:20:28.276 --> 0:20:32.276 surprise me. I never met Headvig, so why do I 0:20:32.316 --> 0:20:32.876 feel like this? 0:20:32.996 --> 0:20:33.556 But I do. 0:20:33.636 --> 0:20:37.476 It is very much a part of me, and it's 0:20:37.476 --> 0:20:41.636 almost inexplicable. I'm sort of trying to interrogate it a 0:20:41.676 --> 0:20:44.796 little bit more now because I have to face some 0:20:44.876 --> 0:20:48.476 of these things, some of these situations with the paintings 0:20:49.156 --> 0:20:50.356 and what to do with a legacy. 0:20:51.436 --> 0:20:54.916 I think it's a really interesting and important point because 0:20:55.316 --> 0:20:58.196 you know, it was when your father pursued some of 0:20:58.236 --> 0:21:02.956 these claims. It's not just about the art, it's about healing. 0:21:03.476 --> 0:21:07.196 Oh yeah, absolutely, It's not necessarily about material possesions. The 0:21:07.236 --> 0:21:12.076 material possessions are kind of like the marker or it's 0:21:12.276 --> 0:21:15.796 everything orience itself around, but it's not actually what this 0:21:15.916 --> 0:21:16.836 is really all about. 0:21:17.076 --> 0:21:18.116 The art is a symbol. 0:21:18.956 --> 0:21:22.076 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 0:21:22.196 --> 0:21:25.396 I think it's important to understand what Claude Ollen was 0:21:25.516 --> 0:21:28.876 up against in his attempt to locate his grandmother's lost 0:21:28.996 --> 0:21:33.956 art collection. So allow me a digression about a man 0:21:34.036 --> 0:21:40.476 named Charles Venable. Some years ago, Venable was named director 0:21:40.516 --> 0:21:44.316 of the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. It was 0:21:44.356 --> 0:21:47.956 his first director's job, and he decided to begin by 0:21:47.996 --> 0:21:50.676 taking a close look at the museum's collection. 0:21:51.076 --> 0:21:54.436 And it started with our works on paper collection, where 0:21:54.476 --> 0:21:56.596 we were just going to get an you know, get 0:21:56.636 --> 0:21:58.356 some expertise in and we will to look at every 0:21:58.396 --> 0:21:59.356 single work on paper. 0:22:00.116 --> 0:22:02.916 To help him, Venable brought in a former curator from 0:22:02.956 --> 0:22:05.276 the Cleveland Museum of Art, which is one of the 0:22:05.276 --> 0:22:08.316 country's best collections of works on paper. 0:22:09.196 --> 0:22:11.676 The time we went through everything, she said, you have 0:22:11.876 --> 0:22:16.636 about fifty exceptional pieces out of how many It wasn't 0:22:16.676 --> 0:22:20.556 a huge collection, but we probably had a couple thousand 0:22:21.396 --> 0:22:24.636 oh pieces. And then she said, and here's another group 0:22:24.676 --> 0:22:26.516 that are nice. But in the end it was like, 0:22:26.596 --> 0:22:28.156 you should just get rid of all of these. 0:22:28.436 --> 0:22:31.796 Keep the fifty good ones, the a pluses, the rest 0:22:32.196 --> 0:22:35.036 venables sold at auction. And if I'd asked you before 0:22:35.076 --> 0:22:38.956 that process began in Louisville, what percentage were a plus? 0:22:38.956 --> 0:22:39.796 What would you have said? 0:22:40.156 --> 0:22:43.156 Works on paper not my curatorial area. But nevertheless I 0:22:43.156 --> 0:22:47.236 would have said, you know, you would have to have 0:22:47.316 --> 0:22:49.876 half of them I suppose be exceptional works of art, 0:22:49.956 --> 0:22:52.636 or why would you have taken them? 0:22:52.836 --> 0:22:56.876 Venable next became the director of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, 0:22:57.196 --> 0:23:00.956 or as it is now known, New Fields. When he arrived, 0:23:01.196 --> 0:23:04.596 the museum had fifty five thousand objects. It was adding 0:23:04.636 --> 0:23:07.156 close to one thousand new objects a year, and was 0:23:07.196 --> 0:23:10.396 on the verge of building a multimillion dollar storage facility 0:23:10.676 --> 0:23:15.316 to house its ever expanding collection. And Venable's main thought 0:23:15.476 --> 0:23:19.516 was what if Indianapolis was like Louisville and much of 0:23:19.516 --> 0:23:22.636 the stuff they were storing at such great expense wasn't 0:23:22.676 --> 0:23:26.916 worth keeping. So he and his curators at Newfields began 0:23:27.036 --> 0:23:30.396 coming through every one of the objects in the museum's collection. 0:23:31.196 --> 0:23:35.676 They assigned each artwork a grade. A was for something 0:23:35.876 --> 0:23:38.836 that any museum in the world would want. These were 0:23:38.876 --> 0:23:41.756 things that made sense for Indianapolis to have it in 0:23:41.756 --> 0:23:47.316 its collection. C's were d's didn't belong at all. The 0:23:47.356 --> 0:23:51.516 good stuff and the bad stuff were easy to identify, 0:23:51.556 --> 0:23:54.036 but it took years to figure out the bees and c's. 0:23:54.676 --> 0:23:58.516 The curators did tons of research, debated, and kept going 0:23:59.036 --> 0:23:59.996 piece by piece. 0:24:01.556 --> 0:24:05.596 Our collection is now about forty four thousand works of art, 0:24:06.956 --> 0:24:10.196