New laws trigger a legal fight over Nazi-looted art in L.A. and Auschwitz museums

LOS ANGELES — Jewish heirs of Holocaust victims and their representatives have filed two lawsuits in California staking their claims to Nazi-looted paintings that still hang on the walls of prominent museums in Los Angeles and Auschwitz.

This pair of lawsuits are the first to be filed after the recent passage of laws by California and Congress, which strengthen U.S.-based claims to artwork that were forcibly taken from Jewish families during World War II.

One lawsuit was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday by the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles and its board chair Daniel Gryczman against Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena for the return of “Adam and Eve.” These are two life-size oil-on-panel masterpieces created by Lucas Carnach the Elder in 1530.

The other lawsuit was filed in federal court in Los Angeles the same day by the daughters of the late Dinah Gottliebova Babbitt, a Holocaust survivor and California-based animator who was held in Auschwitz. It demanded the return of watercolors of fellow prisoners that the artist was forced to paint for Josef Mengele, a Nazi physician who had earned the nickname the “Angel of Death.”

Spokespersons for both museums say the museums legally hold…

Original source: https://www.nbcnews.com/business