NEW YORK CITY — The Museum of Modern Art and the heirs of German art collector Max Fischer have announced that they have reached an agreement for the restitution of a German Expressionist painting by Ernst Kirchner “Sand Hills (Bei Gruenau),” was inherited by Fischer from his parents and has been known in MoMA’s collection as “Sand Hills in Engadine,” 1917–18 This Ernst Ludwig Kirchner oil on canvas painting was known in MoMA’s collection as “Sand Hills in Engadine,” 1917–18 MoMA’s provenance team correctly identified the location of the landscape as the Muggel hills in Gruenau Following inquiry by the family through their attorney and working in close collaboration with them multiyear research effort into the history of the painting Documentation shows that the painting was in Fischer’s collection until at least early 1933 and was acquired in Germany by art collector Kurt Feldhäusser in 1938 Fischer had emigrated to the United States from Nazi Germany leaving some works in his collection behind a collector of modern German art and a former curator was killed in a bombing in Germany in 1945 The painting was consigned by his mother to the Weyhe Gallery in New York City that year and MoMA acquired it from the gallery under the title “Dunes at Fehmarn” in 1949 The title was later changed to “Sand Hills in Engadine” in consultation with the Kirchner scholar Donald Gordon MoMA’s research revealed three essential findings that led the museum to determine that the painting should be returned to the family: the paintings “Sand Hills (Bei Gruenau)” and “Sand Hills in Engadine” are one and the same; the painting had remained in Germany during the Nazi period; and Max Fischer likely did not have full knowledge of or choice regarding the sale of the work nor received its proceeds Lowry said: “Provenance research is an important and ongoing practice at MoMA We are grateful to the Fischer family and to David Rowland for their collaboration and are pleased that the painting will be restituted to the heirs of Max Fischer.” “The Ludwig and Rosy Fischer collection was one of the most important collections of Expressionist art assembled in Germany prior to the onslaught of the Nazi era Max Fischer and his brother Ernst inherited this incredible collection but Max Fischer lost a good part of this inheritance when he fled Germany in 1935,” said Rowland “MoMA’s professional handling of this matter analysis of complex historical information and ultimate restitution of this Kirchner artwork is an example of museum best practices in the handling of Nazi-era art claims The heirs of Max Fischer are grateful to MoMA for their return of this important artwork.” The museum is at 11 West 53rd Street. For information, www.moma.org or 212-708-9431 Lawrence “Larry” Gruenau Drechsler Iowa to Jo Seaman Drechsler and the late Carma Gruenau Drechsler He graduated from Augustana College in Rock Island Illinois with a bachelor’s degree in art and then attended an art institute in Stockholm and enlisted in the Army where he served as an artist during the Vietnam War returning often to visits friends and undertake a variety of projects His life and work will be celebrated at a public memorial Brief tributes in word or song are welcomed Remembering Larry Drechsler on the web at www.facebook.com/lgdrechsler. Join thousands already receiving our daily newsletter. Copyright © 2025 The Journal Publishing Company | https://www.shepherdstownchronicle.com | 123C S. Duke Street, Shepherdstown, WV 25443 | 304-876-3380 Thunderstorms likely this evening. Then a chance of scattered thunderstorms overnight. A few storms may be severe. Low 67F. Winds ESE at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Your browser is out of date and potentially vulnerable to security risks.We recommend switching to one of the following browsers: MoMA’s curator of painting and sculpture Leah Dickerman, who led the research, says that after a decade-long investigation, there was a breakthrough in the case when researchers found links between the painting, an old picture postcard and a woodcut by Kirchner. These revealed that the work in MoMA’s collection depicted an entirely different location in Germany than the title suggested. This, along with other inaccurate provenance details (see below), had made the work difficult to trace. “It’s a fascinating story,” says MoMA director Glenn Lowry. “It’s a really successful example of how all parties working together brought us to the right point—which is the understanding that a work of art in our collection actually belonged to the heirs of Max Fischer.” The painting had entered MoMA’s collection in 1949 with the title Dunes at Fehmarn (1912). The title was changed in 1967 at the suggestion of the Kirchner expert Donald Gordon to Sand Hills in Engadine and its date altered to 1917-18 in the museum’s registry. Complicating matters further, the artist’s catalogue raisonnée also misidentified the work, stating that it had been acquired by or was on loan to the Folkwang Museum in Essen when it was seized by the Nazis as “degenerate art”. In 2004, the lawyer David Rowland wrote to MoMA about the painting on behalf of the heirs of Max Fischer. At this point, the museum established that the provenance information in the catalogue was wrong, and told Rowland that it could not find a landscape of either a Fehmarn or Engadine on the list of works compiled by Rosy Fischer, Max’s mother, of the family collection.   The work in the MoMA collection, it turned out, was not a painting of the sandhills in Engadine but of the dunes at Gruenau. “It was only when we were able to crack that nut that suddenly we had the right title and were able to say, yes, this work did belong to the Fischers,” Dickerman says. “It’s not often that we can really track things down the way that we have in this case.” “From here we could eliminate all the possibilities as to what happened to the work during the Nazi period and we finally realised that the work was in Germany with Max Fischer at the start of the war,” Lowry adds. “It was still there in 1935 when Fischer fled and he clearly didn’t have it when he got to the US. So any transaction of the work in-between took place without his knowledge or benefit.” The twists and turns of post-war provenance In around 1925, Rosy Fischer compiled a list of German Modernist she had acquired with her husband Ludwig, including a painting by Kirchner then called Sand Hills (Bei Gruenau), dated 1913. She died the following year and her two sons, Max and Ernst, inherited the collection. It is unclear what happened to the painting between Fischer’s departure and 1938, when a Berlin collector of Expressionist Art, Kurt Feldhäusser, bought two paintings by Kirchner that were “formerly in the collection of Max Fischer”. One of these is listed with the title Dunes at Fehmarn, which is a German island off the Danish coast. In 1945, Feldhäusser was killed during the Allied bombing of Nuremberg and his collection was transferred to his mother, who had emigrated to New York. In 1949, MoMA bought the work, still titled Dunes at Fehmarn, as one in a group of five paintings from the Weyhe Gallery in New York, consigned to the gallery by Feldhäusser’s mother. 'I was amazed. Such a cheeky lout,' he continued, before revealing he was suing the police. 'Suddenly should I be the culprit? I am innocent, was never culpable.' Prince Ernst August of Hanover and Princess Caroline of HanoverAlain BENAINOUS / Gamma-Rapho via Getty ImagesSince then, the royal has had a change of heart, apologising for his past behaviour in court. 'I would like to apologise for everything to those involved, I regret what happened and I am ready for the damage to come up,' he said. 'From my point of view, that says it all.' As well as the 10-month suspended sentence, the court also ruled that Ernst August must move out of his home of 50 years. It comes amidst another lawsuit that the royal has filed against his son who he accuses of acting ungratefully following the sale of Marienburg Castle News broke earlier this week that Ernst August Jr is expecting his third child with his Russian fashion designer wife Ekaterina Malysheva The couple are already parents to three-year-old Elisabeth and two-year-old August Subscribe now for a trial offer of 3 issues for £1 plus free digital editions and home delivery.