Directory of art market Players in France during the Occupation (RAMA)

In the fall of 2016, the National Institute for Art History(INHA), in partnership with the Technical University of Berlin, the Collège de France, the Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste in Magdeburg, and the German Center for Art History, launched a research program. This program follows the digitization of wartime auction catalogs undertaken by the INHA in 2013 and aims to create a Directory of Art Market Players in France during the Occupation.

More than seventy-five years after the end of World War II, our knowledge about the transfers, trafficking, and looting of artworks during the German occupation in France remains incomplete but is steadily improving. While numerous individual investigations have been conducted in recent years, a comprehensive identification of all the art market players from that era, their transactions, and the artworks that passed through their hands is essential. This effort will provide a stable foundation for documenting artworks and researching their history and provenance.

During the German occupation, the art market thrived, involving numerous actors, both German and French. This boom was driven by the influx of goods from confiscations and looting of individuals classified as Jewish by German ordinances, Vichy laws, and the Commissariat Général aux Questions Juives. The exclusion and often elimination of traditional market players also led to new actors disrupting traditional circuits.

The research program initiated by the INHA, the Technical University of Berlin, and their partners aims to study and catalog all the actors (art dealers, gallery owners, brokers, experts, second-hand dealers, antique dealers, auctioneers, transporters, photographers, art historians, museum staff, artists, collectors, enthusiasts, victims, intermediaries of all kinds) who were at the center of artistic and commercial exchanges between France and Germany. This project aims to rigorously document and reconstruct the journeys of people and artworks, highlighting movements and networks through a dynamic spatio-temporal approach.

This directory will primarily take the form of a free and accessible database with individual entries allowing for systematic cross-checking and verification of information. These entries will be strictly factual, based on research primarily conducted in German and French archives, as well as archives from other relevant countries (USA, Belgium, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Russia, etc.). The goal is to provide a reliable and scientific tool for all users, including citizens, researchers, and art professionals concerned with verifying the provenance of artworks, whether they are in public collections, private hands, or on the market.

This research program is supported by a sponsorship campaign. For more information, please visit the dedicated page.