Philharmonic Gives Back Paul Signac Masterpiece

“Port-en-Bessin” by neo-Impressionist Paul Signac

“Port-en-Bessin” by neo-Impressionist Paul Signac

The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra will return to a French family a valuable painting that was looted by the Nazis and given to the orchestra as a gift in 1940 by a Viennese secret police official.
The heirs of the painting’s late owner, Marcel Koch, will receive “Port-en-Bessin” by neo-Impressionist Paul Signac at a ceremony this year, the orchestra said on Saturday, announcing the latest step to address its past association with Nazism.
About half the Philharmonic’s musicians were Nazi party members by 1942, four years after Hitler’s annexation of Austria. Thirteen musicians with Jewish origins or relations were driven out of the orchestra and five died in concentration camps.
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