Argentine couple to return Nazi-looted painting to rightful owner
The late-baroque Portrait of a Lady was lost for 80 years until it was spotted in photographs of a house for sale near Buenos Aires.
Argentine couple to return Nazi-looted painting to rightful owner
A painting stolen by the Nazis and recovered in Argentina last year must now be handed back to the heir of its rightful owner, a court has decided.
The late-baroque *Portrait of a Lady* had been missing for 80 years before it was identified in photographs of a house for sale near Buenos Aires.
That house belonged to Patricia Kadgien, the daughter of a Nazi fugitive who fled there after the Second World War, and she has now agreed to return the painting in exchange for avoiding prosecution for hiding it from the authorities.
*Portrait of a Lady* was one of more than 1,000 artworks looted from the collection of Jewish art dealer Jacques Goudstikker after the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands in 1940.
His daughter-in-law and sole heir, Marei von Saher, plans for the painting to be shown on temporary loan at the Holocaust Museum of Buenos Aires to raise awareness of the issue, Argentine newspaper Clarin reports.
Von Saher has previously said her family "aims to bring back every single artwork robbed from Jacques' collection, and to restore his legacy".
The painting was first identified in August 2025 by the Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad (AD) on an estate agent's website for a property in the coastal town of Mar del Plata.
It was hanging above a green sofa in the living room of Patricia Kadgien, whose father Friedrich Kadgien had been a senior adviser to Hermann Goring, Adolf Hitler's deputy. Goring plundered thousands of works across Europe.
Patricia Kadgien and her husband Juan Carlos Cortegoso appeared with their lawyer in a court near Buenos Aires on Friday
Last September, Patricia Kadgien and her husband were charged with concealment and placed under house arrest after a search of her property initially failed to locate the painting.
But at Friday's hearing in Mar del Plata, all criminal proceedings against the couple were suspended.
The deal reached between the families and prosecutors means Kadgien and her husband will surrender all rights to the artwork and must donate 4.8 million pesos (£2,356; $3,185) to local hospitals.
*Portrait of a Lady*, also known as *Contessa Colleoni*, is attributed to the late-baroque artist Giuseppe Ghislandi.
However, experts have questioned the artwork's provenance, with some scholars attributing it to Giacomo Ceruti - another Italian artist from the same period.