Germany returns Nazi-looted Renaissance panels to Jewish heirs

Our daily round-up of news from the art world

Germany returns Nazi-looted panels to Jewish heirs | The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation has organised the return of two 15th-century panels by the Sienese painter Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia to the heirs of Harry Fuld Senior, a Jewish businessman and collector. Both panels, which were in the collection of Berlin’s Gemäldegalerie, date from around 1455 and each contains a scene from the life of St Clare of Assisi. They entered Germany’s national collection in 1940; Fuld’s wife and children had fled the country to escape the Nazi regime. There are as many as 500 further artefacts that once belonged to the Fuld family and have not yet been recovered. 

Christian Dior exhibition was V&A’s most-visited | The V&A announced today that ‘Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams’ has beaten records to become the most-visited exhibition in the museum’s history. The show, which opened on 2 February and closed to the public on Sunday, drew in 594,994 visitors, topping the previous record of 493,043 set by ‘Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty’ in 2015 (although the earlier exhibition, which had a shorter run, had a higher rate of daily visitors). Read Fatema Ahmed’s essay on the rising vogue for fashion exhibitions, first published in the May 2019 issue of Apollo, here.

MCH sells majority stake in India Art Fair to Angus Montgomery Arts | The Swiss MCH Group has sold its 65 per cent stake in the India Art Fair to the fair’s co-owner, Hong Kong events company Angus Montgomery Arts, which is now the sole-owner. The fair joins the company’s considerable portfolio of art fairs in Asia, which includes Art SG and Art Central Hong Kong.

Alan Cristea Gallery renamed as Cristea Roberts Gallery | Alan Cristea Gallery has announced that is has been renamed Cristea Roberts Gallery. The updated name is intended to reflect the 20-year partnership between Alan Cristea and David Cleaton-Roberts, a co-director at the gallery.