Welcome Message
The Center for Art Collection Ethics (ACE) at the University of Denver (DU) is pleased to offer this hybrid training program on the fundamentals of Nazi-era art provenance research, June 19–23, 2023. In partnership with DU’s Center for Professional Development, our on-campus certificate program is geared toward graduate students in any field and emerging museum professionals, with generous support from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. Selected streamed sessions are available to the broader public, who have registered as non-certificate students. For seamless and secure program delivery, we are using the OpenWater virtual conferencing platform.
Our planning team includes Renée Albiston, Associate Museum Director at the Kirkland Museum Fine & Decorative Art, and contracted provenance researcher of Nazi-era art at the Denver Art Museum; Elizabeth Campbell, Associate Professor of History at DU and Director of ACE; and MacKenzie Mallon, Specialist, Provenance, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri.
Session recordings will be available to all registrants for one year.
Please complete the program evaluation here- https://udenver.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eIE2k7ZMi50yPvE
Program Summary
This hybrid training program includes interactive lectures and discussions with top historians, provenance researchers, archivists and museum staff. Streamed talks include: The History and Legacy of Nazi Art Plunder by Elizabeth Campbell; Restitution Claims via Alternative Dispute Resolution, with Anna Rubin and Rebecca Friedman at the Holocaust Claims Processing Office in New York; Identifying works on the market from the Galerie Paul Rosenberg, by MaryKate Cleary, Lecturer of Art Business at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London; a case study of the Siegfriend Laemmle collection, with a screening of the documentary Under the Hammer of the Nazis, and Q and A with Denver descendant Nina McGehee. The morning of Wednesday, June 21 we will feature a streamed visit to the Denver Art Museum, where Renée Albiston will present a case study of a Modigliani painting she researched.
Streamed sessions on research resources include: Introduction to Provenance Research Resources by Kate Chimenti; archival resources abroad and in the United States, including presentations by Sylvia Naylor from the National Archives and Records Administration, Megan Lewis at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Anna Bottinelli at the Monuments Men and Women Foundation, and experts at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles. We will discuss digital resources available on databases, and the long-proposed but unfulfilled mission to create a single database with data on Nazi-plundered art with Marc Masurovsky, co-founder of the Holocaust Art Restitution Project. Renée Albiston and MacKenzie Mallon will lead several training sessions, including writing a clear provenance narrative, with accuracy and transparency.
We are delighted to feature a keynote address on current provenance research efforts in France by David Zivie, Head of the Mission for Research and Restitution of Spoliated Cultural Property between 1933 and 1945, French Ministry of Culture.
In the on-campus portion of the program, certificate students will work in small groups on a provenance research case study, which they will present in a streamed symposium the afternoon of Friday, June 23.
Thank you for joining us!
Remember to tag The Center for Art Collection Ethics (ACE) in your social media posts of the training week!
Instagram: @uofdenver_ace
Twitter: @UofDenver_ACE
