Photo Gallery: Sensational Find in a Bombed-Out Cellar (original) (raw)
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The pieces are thought to have been in an apartment in a building on Königstrasse (King Street) when it was bombed in the late summer of 1944. All the works show fire damage. This piece is called "A Likeness of the Actress Anni Mewes" by Edwin Scharff.
Foto: THOMAS PETER/ REUTERS
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Just how the pieces got to the Königstrasse building remain unclear. Historians think they may have been purchased by a tenant in the building named Erhard Oewerdieck, a government official who was honored after World War II for helping Jews escape the Holocaust. The taller piece in the foreground has not yet been identified. Behind it stands a piece by Gustaf Heinrich Wolff. The smaller sculpture on the right is "Female Bust," by Naum Slutzky.
Foto: THOMAS PETER/ REUTERS
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In total, the Nazis branded some 20,000 works of art as "degenerate." Many of them were sold to generate hard currency for Adolf Hitler's regime. Other works were simply confiscated by Nazi functionaries. Others were simply destroyed. Here, Moll's "Dancer" being admired by archeologist Matthias Wemhoff and Berlin Mayor Klaus Wowereit.
Foto: THOMAS PETER/ REUTERS
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"Pregnant Woman" (1918) by Emy Roeders. While the pieces have been largely cleaned up, most have been left unpolished to indicate the damage done by the fire that destroyed the building on Königstrasse where they were found. "One can see the fate they have lived through and the dignity which they still have," said archeologist Wemhoff on Monday.
Foto: JOHN MACDOUGALL/ AFP
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All of the newly discovered sculptures can be seen in the New Museum as of Tuesday. Here, a piece which has not yet been identified.
Foto: THOMAS PETER/ REUTERS
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"Standing Girl" by Otto Braun. Many of the works of art on the Nazis' list of degenerate art have never been found.
Foto: JOHN MACDOUGALL/ AFP