Picasso painting may be sold at Christie’s

A judge ruled Tuesday that a Picasso painting could be sold at auction, despite an incident that its former owner was forced by the Nazis to market it within the 1930s because his family descended from Jews. U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff issued an order four days after Julius H. Schoeps, an heir to Berlin banker Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, filed a lawsuit in Manhattan to stop the sale.

A Christie's employee looks at a painting entitled 'Portrait de Angel Fernandez de Soto' (The Absinthe Drinker) by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso at Christie's auction house working in London the judge had temporarily blocked the auction of “Portrait de Angel Fernandez de Soto”. The painting techniques, expected to fetch as much as $60 million, was scheduled to become sold at Christie’s “Portrait de Angel Fernandez de Soto” on Wednesday. The painting of de Soto, who shared a studio with Pablo Picasso, can be bought by the Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation, a London-based charity.

Within the lawsuit, Schoeps sought being declared the lawful owner. A lawyer for Schoeps said outside court Tuesday he would refile the truth in state court on Wednesday.

The oil-on-canvas painting, signed and dated 1903, was described in a Christie’s catalog as capturing de Soto’s haunting face: “The elegantly dressed sitter appears to scrutinize the viewer with an intense gaze, his inner agitation suggested from the forceful brushstrokes and also the cloud of smoke hovering above him.”

In the statement Tuesday, the inspiration dismissed Schoeps’ lawsuit as “utterly spurious without legal or factual substance.” It said the painting realistic was purchased at a Sotheby’s auction in 1995 and exhibited on many occasions since. The foundation said the painting’s provenance was never questioned during that 11-year period until now.
Christie’s said the painting had been sold through the foundation for income to be allocated to a number of charitable purposes.

The lawsuit said Mendelssohn-Bartholdy was afflicted by Nazi intimidation that forced him to flee his mansion and start selling prized paintings inside a depressed art market. He placed five Picassos, like the de Soto painting, on consignment with Berlin art dealer Justin K. Thannhauser in 1934, the lawsuit said. According for the lawsuit, Thannhauser sold the painting in 1936 to M. Knoedler & Co. in New York. Mendelssohn-Bartholdy died in 1935. The family included composer Felix Mendelssohn.