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Painting Returns Home


Painting Returns Home

More than 60 years after it disappeared from a Berlin museum in the chaotic aftermath of World War II, a painting depicting the flagellation of Christ was returned home.

The Indiana University Art Museum returned the painting to the Jagdschloss Grunewald in a ceremony Nov. 21, 2011, at Charlottenburg Palace in Germany.

Created by a Cologne master, the Flagellation of Christ dates to the late 15th century and originally formed part of a wing of an altarpiece. It was one of more than a dozen paintings that disappeared from the Berlin museum during the summer of 1945, looted by Russian and British soldiers.

The IU Art Museum acquired the painting in 1985 as a gift from former IU President Herman B Wells. IU officials said Wells purchased the work in good faith from a London art gallery in 1967.