The painting “Murnau mit Kirche II” by Wassily Kandinsky, a Russian Modernist artist, was sold at Sotheby’s auction in London for £37.2 million ($44.55 million). The painting was previously owned by victims of the Nazi Holocaust. It was sold as part of the Modern & Contemporary Evening Auction on Wednesday, and it set a new auction record for the artist. The painting “Rigide et Courbé” was the previous world record holder for a work by Kandinsky, which was sold for $23.3 million at Christie’s in New York in 2016.
“Kandinsky’s Murnau period came to define abstract art for future generations,” Helena Newman, Chairman of Sotheby’s Europe and Worldwide Head of Impressionist & Modern Art, said in a statement according to CNN. “The appearance of such an important painting — one of the last of this period and scale remaining in private hands — is a major moment for the market and for collectors,” she said.
The painting has a rich history. It was sold at an auction as part of the property belonging to the well-known Berlin collectors, Johanna Margarete and Siegbert Stern. The painting was returned to the surviving heirs of the family by the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, Netherlands last year. Family photos reveal that the Kandinsky painting was hung in the dining room of their family home, Villa Stern in Potsdam.
However, after the rise of the Nazi regime in 1933 and the death of her husband two years later, Johanna Margarete had to flee to the Netherlands and was later declared stateless. According to family documents, the painting, along with other artworks, was taken to the Netherlands and believed to have been acquired by a dealer who took advantage of Jewish assets in the occupied country. Johanna Margarete was deported and died in Auschwitz in 1944. Later, in 1951, the painting was sold to the Van Abbemuseum by another dealer. Sotheby’s catalog provided this information.