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Seattle Art Museum can't sue Matisse dealer, judge rules
Friday, October 15, 1999
By REGINA HACKETT
The Seattle Art Museum's effort to sue a New York gallery to recover the value of an Henri Matisse painting hit a Catch-22 wall of contradiction in U.S. District Court this week.
Judge Robert S. Lasnik agreed that the museum had presented enough evidence of fraud on the part of New York's Knoedler Gallery to bring the case to trial, but he said the museum had failed to prove it was the party defrauded. Hence, attorneys for Knoedler won a partial summary judgment and dismissal of the case.
"We disagree with the judge's ruling and are considering our options, including an appeal," said Stuart Dunwoody, the museum's attorney. Museum director Mimi Gates is out of town and unavailable for comment.
The Matisse painting, titled "Odalisque" and valued at $2 million, was sold by Knoedler to Seattle collectors Prentice and Virginia Bloedel in 1954. The Bloedels gave it to the museum in 1991.
There it stayed, often on view, until the painting was reproduced with the comment "whereabouts unknown" in Hector Feliciano's 1996 book, "The Lost Museum: The Nazi Conspiracy To Steal the World's Greatest Works of Art." The Bloedels' grandson, New York photographer Bing Wright, saw the painting in Feliciano's book and notified the heirs of Paul Rosenberg, from whom the painting was stolen by the German Army during World War II.
In June, after two years of research, the museum concluded that, because the painting had been looted by the Nazis, it should be returned to Rosenberg's heirs.
The museum convinced Judge Lasnik there was evidence of fraud, citing a letter Knoedler sent to the Bloedels saying the gallery did not know who owned the painting after Matisse, even though it had catalogs proving "Odalisque" had been in Rosenberg's collection.
But while there is evidence Knoedler defrauded the Bloedels, the judge said, there is no evidence that Knoedler defrauded the museum because the museum did not acquire the Bloedels' right to sue when it acquired the painting.
Attorney Lewis Clayton, representing Knoedler, insists that no one can sue. "Nobody was defrauded," he said, "and certainly not the museum that paid nothing for the painting."
Dunwoody countered: "Obviously there's a loss. The Bloedels thought they owned a valuable work of art, which they could give to the people of Seattle. That they did not in fact own the painting after paying for it is a loss."
Dunwoody said the Bloedel heirs might assign their right to sue to the museum, or might sue Knoedler themselves. The Bloedels' daughter, Virginia Wright, a major Seattle art collector and supporter of the museum, is out of town and could not be reached yesterday.
Because art museum collections are built largely from donated works, Lasnik's ruling raises the question of whether museums have any ownership rights to donated material.
Clayton said subsequent action can no longer be brought in Seattle, but Dunwoody disagreed.
"Wrong," he said, adding that he wasn't sure if the museum would choose to appeal. A decision might be made by the end of the year, he said.
P-I art critic Regina Hackett can be reached at 206-448-8332 or reginahackett@seattle-pi.com
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