Max Weintraub, President and CEO of the Allentown Art Museum, says, “It was extremely important for the museum to address the ethical aspects of the painting’s history in the Bromberg family. This artwork only came to market and ultimately found its way to the museum because Henry Bromberg had to flee persecution by Nazi Germany. This moral imperative compelled us to act. We hope that this voluntary action by the museum will inform and encourage similar institutions to find fair and just solutions.”
The Bromberg family says: “We are pleased that another painting from our grandparents’ art collection has been identified and are pleased that the Allentown Art Museum has identified the provenance of the portrait of George the Bearded, Duke of Saxony and the circumstances under which Henry and Hertha Bromberg had to part with it during the Nazi era. After emigrating to the USA, our grandparents first settled in New Jersey. After a few years they moved to Yardley, Pennsylvania, to be near their son Edgar and his family. This makes the fair and just solution for the painting in the Allentown Art Museum very special.”
The Allentown Art Museum was pleased to reach a fair and just resolution with the Bromberg heirs in accordance with the principles of the Washington Conference on Nazi-Confiscated Art and the applicable guidelines of the International Council of Museums (ICOM), the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), and the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD). The Attorney General of Pennsylvania has approved the museum’s decision to remove the painting from its holdings. It will be included in Christie’s Old Masters auction in New York in January 2025.
The museum will highlight the work in a special exhibition of two paintings owned by Jewish families in Germany in the years before World War II, illustrating the artworks’ different evolutions during and after the Nazi era. The installation will be on view from August 29 to October 20, 2024, and will include educational information about the museum’s decision to withdraw or officially remove “Portrait of George the Bearded” from its collection, as it was previously owned by the Bromberg family of Hamburg.
Main image: Lucas Cranach the Elder and workshop (German, 1472–1553), Portrait of George the Bearded, Duke of Saxony, ca. 1534, oil on panel.
