Mocking, Looting, Selling: Nazi Strategies of Dealing with Modern Art

This broadly encompassing talk will survey art policy under National Socialism. The Nazis used art and art policy as a propaganda instrument, incriminating modern works as “degenerate art” (“Entartete Kunst”), while also promoting modern art to illustrate their racist ideology. Compelled under pressure from the NS regime, victims–primarily Jews–sold their collections or lost them through looting (“Raubkunst”). The talk will also consider the so-called “Schwabing Art Trove,” the highly publicized long-lost collection held by Cornelius Gurlitt, which was seized by the public prosecutor’s office in Munich in 2012 .

A native German, Christoph Zuschlag studied art history, history, and archaeology in Heidelberg and Vienna. Since 2007, he has taught art history and art education at the University of Koblenz-Landau, and since 2015 he has served as a member of the advisory board of the Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste (German Lost Art Foundation).

$10; $5 Mia members, free for Decorative Arts, Textiles, and Sculpture Affinity Group members.

To register, call (612) 870-6323 or reserve online.