Nazi-looted Monet, missing for over 80 years, returned to heirs of original owners in New Orleans: FBI

NEW ORLEANS — The FBI returned an original Monet artwork to the descendants of its rightful owners on Wednesday, after the artwork had been presumed lost for over 80 years to Nazi looters.

"Bord de Mer," or "Seaside" in English, is an 18-3/8 x 22-3/8-inch pastel-on-paper depicting a beach in Normandy, France. Believed to have been completed in 1865, it is one of Monet's earlier works which inspired his oil paintings later in his storied career.

The FBI's Art Crime Team, in conjunction with the New York and New Orleans field offices, returned the Monet to the surviving granddaughters of Adalbert and Hilda Parlagi, Helen Lowe and Françoise Parlagi in Louisiana at the FBI Field Office in New Orleans. 

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Ultimately, the matter was decided in the Eastern District Court for the state of Louisiana by Judge Fallon, giving legal rights of "Bord de Mer" to the heirs of the original owners, after Dr. and Mrs. Kevin Schlamp "graciously" relinquished their rights to the artwork.

"We are gathered here today to announce an act of kindness," said Special Agent in Charge Lyonel Myrthil during the repatriation ceremony.

The Schlamps purchased "Bord de Mer" from New Orleans art and antiques dealer M.S. Rau in 2021, unaware it was a looted during WWII. Unfortunately, Kevin Schlamp died before he could see the repatriation ceremony take place on Wednesday.

Adalbert and Hilda Parlagi first purchased the Monet original for their family's personal collection in Vienna, before having to flee Nazi-occupied Austria in 1938, after the Anschluss.

"As Jews, [the Parlagis] were terrified of what was going to happen to them," Commission for Looted Art in Europe (CLAE) co-chair Anne Webber, CBE, told Fox News Digital. "And they fled, leaving absolutely everything behind, then they made their way through Switzerland, eventually to London."

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According to Webber, the Parlagi family's Vienna apartment and all the artwork within it was seized by the German Gestapo after they fled to England.

"But the Nazis had other ideas and what they did was that they seized the property, and they confiscated it in 1940, and they put it up for sale in 1941 and 1942," said Webber.

In the 80-plus years since, Adalbert "Bela" Parlagi and his surviving descendants held on to the hope that the early artwork by the storied impressionist master would be discovered somewhere. Adalbert passed on in 1981, decades before he could see "Bord de Mer" returned to his grandchildren.

In 2014, Helen Lowe and Françoise Parlagi approached the CLAE to try and track down the priceless artwork. 

According to its website, CLAE is "an international, expert and nonprofit representative body which researches, identifies and recovers looted property on behalf of families, communities, institutions and governments worldwide." 

Retired Special Agent Randy Deaton said that the FBI's Arts Crime Team is a national unit comprised of 21 agents who "always need the help of the professional historians and museums" to put together their investigations. 

"It takes a team," Deaton told Fox News Digital.

The detailed research provided by the CLAE to the FBI helped authorities track down the Monet painting to M.S Rau in New Orleans, where it had been purchased by the Schlamp family. Mrs. Schlamp told Fox News Digital "we were in shock" at the discovery of the true provenance of "Bord de Mer."

"[Kevin] would have been very proud to see this work given back to its rightful owners today," Mrs. Schlamp told Fox News Digital.

"There are many people who buy works in good faith, not knowing the history of them," said Webber. "And to learn, once you learn the history, and once you learn the terrible history in this case, of a work that was seized from I mean, the family were lucky to escape with their lives and to then agree to return it to that family who have missed it for all these years is a wonderful, wonderful act."

In the meantime, Parlagi's surviving granddaughters are "over the moon" about the discovery and repatriation of their grandfather's Monet artwork.

"I wouldn't have believed it, even a few years ago, that we would be in this situation. It would have been, it is the whole thing, is unbelievable. And I can only say that my grandfather would have, wouldn't have believed it either. So it makes it so special," Françoise Parlagi told Fox News Digital.

"I've been thinking about that quite a lot since I arrived in New Orleans, thinking about my mother and how she would have been," Helen Lowe told Fox News Digital. "I think she would have been completely over the moon about the whole thing, knowing that she just would have had a sense of disbelief. I think, thinking about what was lost, you know, to the family, and I feel as if she's very close at the moment."

Webber, as well as Lowe and Parlagi, will receive a private tour of the National World War II Museum in New Orleans later on Wednesday afternoon.

"Bord de Mer" has been "safely stored" in the FBI New Orleans field office evidence locker during the extent of the investigation, according to Special Agent in Charge Lyonel Myrthil. It is unclear when or where the painting will be transported now that it legally belongs to Lowe and Parlagi.

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This story began in a "shipping container in a Viennese warehouse in 1938 to this room in New Orleans today," said Webber.