Bavaria Eases Return of Looted Art, Will Restitute Watercolor

Bavaria’s regional parliament eased the return of looted art to the heirs of victims of the Nazis by eliminating a rule requiring the state government to be compensated for restitutions.

The restriction was lifted after the heirs of Valerie Heissfeld, a Jewish widow living in Vienna in 1938, laid claim to a watercolor in Munich’s Staatliche Graphische Sammlung. The painting, by Rudolf von Alt, was looted by the Nazis after Heissfeld fled Vienna. Martin Bormann, Adolf Hitler’s private secretary, acquired it and kept it in Obersalzberg.