A painting by Auguste Renoir titled "Laveuse" (Washerwoman), which was stolen from a Jewish art dealer during World War II and later returned to his heirs, sold for €303,312 including fees at auction on Friday, December 5, at the Hôtel Drouot in Paris. The artwork had been estimated to sell between €220,000 and €300,000, representing a decrease from its previous sale of €332,000 at the same auction house in 2023.
The small 30x35 cm painting, created by Auguste Renoir around 1916, depicts three colorful silhouettes of women against a body of water in a vibrant setting. The work represents a departure from Renoir's typical figurative style, as explained by Alexandre Giquello, auctioneer and president of Drouot, who noted before the sale that "we are at the border between abstraction and the end of Impressionism."
The painting's history is as compelling as the artwork itself. It originally belonged to Alfred Weinberger, a Hungarian art dealer who had established himself in Paris during the 1920s. During World War II, the Nazis seized the painting along with Weinberger's entire collection, which included five Renoir works and one Delacroix. One of the confiscated Renoirs, "Two Women in a Garden," was recognized when it was put up for sale in the United States and was returned to Weinberger's granddaughter in 2018. The other paintings from his collection have never resurfaced.
"Laveuse" reappeared during an estate inventory conducted by the Giquello auction house and was sold at Drouot in 2023. However, it was only after the transaction, during the administrative formalities, that the painting attracted attention. Giquello then contacted a German law firm specializing in tracking down objects stolen by the Nazis to locate the legitimate owners and return their property, which they subsequently put back up for sale.
Remarkably, the "Laveuse" was already photographed in the French government's search engine for confiscated works, according to Alexandre Giquello. "Nobody had seen that it had been stolen," the auctioneer explained. Before the 2023 sale, "our expert, the Direction of Museums of France, the Wildenstein Institute (whose archives are a reference in the art world) - everyone had examined this painting and nobody had seen that it had been stolen." The painting had changed names several times over the years, making it impossible to find in databases.
The restitution process highlights ongoing efforts to return Nazi-looted art to rightful owners or their descendants, decades after the end of World War II. The case demonstrates both the challenges in identifying stolen artworks and the dedication of specialists working to correct historical injustices in the art world.
In related auction news, another Renoir painting, "L'Enfant et ses jouets" (The Child and His Toys), which depicts the painter's son, future filmmaker Jean Renoir, and his nanny, was sold for €1.8 million at Drouot on November 25, showing the continued strong market for the Impressionist master's works.
