Bolstered by New Laws, Lawsuits in Los Angeles Renew Bids for Restitution of Nazi-Looted Art

On Monday, two new lawsuits were filed in Los Angeles in the hopes of recovering long-disputed, but so far unsuccessful, claims for the return of Nazi-looted art from renowned museums, reports the Los Angeles Times. Their timing is no coincidence. The heirs or representatives of Jews who lost artworks during the Holocaust are hoping that the passage of a new law in California and a second one at the federal level will turn the tables in their favor.

Those laws include one that was passed in California in 2024, while the second, known as the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery (HEAR) Act of 2025, was signed by President Trump in April. Both are designed to facilitate the restitution of artworks taken “as a result of political persecution.” Importantly, they require that cases no longer be dismissed on technical legal grounds or due to the passage of time.

Previously, the laws of the country in which the disputed artwork was located superseded California state law. The new provisions reverse that legal technicality and allow for California law to apply. The legislation was inspired by a notorious, ongoing case between the heirs of Jewish collector Lilly Cassirer Neubauer and Madrid’s Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza over the rightful ownership of a Nazi-looted Camille Pissarro painting.

According to the LA Times, Monday’s lawsuits are the first such cases filed in California that are well-positioned to benefit from the changed legislation aimed at restituting Nazi-looted art. One was filed in Los Angeles federal court by daughters of Dina Gottliebova Babbitt. It demands that the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland restitute watercolors that Babbitt was forced to paint while imprisoned in the concentration camp. Nazi pseudoscientist Josef Mengele ordered Babbitt to paint the people he tortured, and these firsthand accounts of his war crimes are on view in the museum, which has refused to relinquish them.

The watercolors “must remain in the Memorial as part of the documentation of the crimes of Mengele,” stated Pawel Sawicki, a spokesperson for the memorial, in a message to the paper. “The portraits of Roma victims are the few remaining fragments of the documentation made by Mengele as part of his criminal experiments. Therefore, they should be treated as unique documents related to the history of Auschwitz,” added Sawicki.

The second case was filed the same day by the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles and Daniel Gryczman in Los Angeles Superior Court. It demands the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena return a 16th-century diptych by Lucas Cranach the Elder, titled Adam and Eve. The Cranach masterpiece was originally part of a large collection belonging to Dutch Jewish dealer Jacques Goudstikker, which was seized by the Nazis.

Allied forces later returned much of the collection to the Dutch government, which sold the diptych to collector Norton Simon, and the museum’s namesake, in 1971. Goudstikker’s surviving heir, Marei von Saher, gave her rights to the painting to the Jewish Federation and its board chair, Gryczman. The latter told the LA Times that if the painting were returned and later sold, they would use any proceeds to support financially struggling Holocaust survivors in the Los Angeles area.

“My grandfather lost his life fleeing the Nazi invasion, and many of his family members were sent to Auschwitz and did not survive,” said Von Saher’s daughter Charlène. “Victory would be justice, and a piece of the puzzle to restoring my grandfather’s legacy and his collection.”