Albert Theer’s 1847 Watercolor Returned to Family of its Rightful Owner

Deputy Consul General Johannes Gassner (l.) with Jacqueline Sondell, Eduard Epstein’s great-niece and heir, and Honorary Consul Dr. Kurt Witte (r.)

Photo: Austrian Consulate General New York

An 1847 watercolor by Albert Theer has been returned to the family of its rightful owner, 86 years after it was lost to Nazi persecution.

Eduard Epstein was a Viennese textile merchant and art collector. After the “Anschluss” in 1938, his business was liquidated, his home was searched by the Gestapo, and he was imprisoned for nearly a year following a failed attempt to move assets out of the country.

In 1940, after being forced to sell his property, Epstein applied to take the remainder of his art collection abroad. Most of it was approved for export – except a small watercolor miniature by Albert Theer, which was instead acquired by Vienna’s Museum of Military History for a nominal sum.

Many decades later, Austria’s Art Restitution Advisory Board recommended returning the painting to Epstein’s heirs. Following thorough investigation by the Commission on Provenance Research, that recommendation was carried out in early August: Deputy Consul General Johannes Gassner traveled to Minneapolis, where he was joined by Honorary Consul Dr. Kurt Witte to personally hand over the painting to Jacqueline Sondell, Eduard Epstein’s great-niece and heir, in the presence of her family and members of the local Jewish community.