SYMPOSIUM
Paintings, Politics and the Monuments Men: the Berlin Masterpieces in America

Friday, September 24th, 2021

This virtual symposium expands upon themes of the exhibition Paintings, Politics and the Monuments Men. Speakers will explore interdisciplinary connections that link the past to the present through art as diplomacy, restitution efforts, and art and cultural heritage law and preservation. Each presentation will be followed by audience questions, and a moderated panel discussion among the speakers will conclude the day.

Welcome & Exhibition Tour: Cameron Kitchin, Louis and Louise Dieterle Nippert Director, and Peter Jonathan Bell, Curator of European Paintings, Sculpture and Drawings, Cincinnati Art Museum


Session One: "Degenerate Art" and German reconstruction: rehabilitating modernist art in postwar Munich
Jennifer McComas, Curator of European and American Art, Eskenazi Museum of Art, Indiana University



Session Two: What the Nazis stole from Richard Neumann (and the search to get it back)
Claire Whitner, Director of Curatorial Affairs and James A. Welu Curator of European Art, Worcester Art Museum

Session Three: Nazi looting and modern litigation in the United States
Jennifer Kreder, Professor of Law, Chase College of Law, Northern Kentucky University

Keynote: Saving endangered cultural heritage today
Richard Kurin, Smithsonian Distinguished Scholar and Ambassador-at-Large, and Interim Director, Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, Smithsonian

Panel discussion: Richard Kurin, Jennifer Kreder, Jennifer McComas, Claire Whitner, Kristi Nelson, Peter Bell

Convened by the Cincinnati Art Museum and the University of Cincinnati; organized by Peter J. Bell, Curator of European Paintings, Sculpture and Drawings, and Kristi A. Nelson, Professor Emeritus.