Madonna and child

The Madonna figure is on loan from the Federal Office for Central Services and Unresolved Property Issues. Measuring 72 cm in height, it is carved from stone. Parts of its once colourful painting can still be identified. Mary, wearing a crown and long robe, carries her child in her arms, supported lightly on her left hip. The Child Jesus is missing his left arm. The figure is thought to have been made in France around 1350, although there is no further information on this. What is certain, however, is that the sculpture had been in Hermann Göring’s collection since 1941, having been sold to him by the Munich art dealer Walter Bornheim. The latter no longer recalled, however, whether he had acquired the Madonna figure in France and when. These uncertainties mean that an earlier loss of assets due to Nazi persecution cannot be ruled out. For this reason, the Federal Office for the Settlement of Unresolved Property Issues has become involved. Through restitution or reparation, the Office compensates people who, for racial, political, religious or ideological reasons, lost their assets between 1933 and 1945 as a result of coercive measures.