Unscrupulous opportunists: Second-rate German art dealers as Nazi functionaries during World War Two

摘要

This dissertation focuses on a group of opportunistic German art dealers who acted as collaborators with the Nazis in confiscating paintings during World War II, including Maria Almas-Dietrich, Gustav Rochlitz, Alois Miedl, and Hans Wendland. In so doing, it demonstrates the complexity of Nazi looting, by showing how collaborators took advantage of competing Nazi interests in order to enrich themselves. Second-rate, lesser-known German art dealers like these four were important cogs in the Nazis' confiscation machine. Even though they operated on the periphery of so-called official Nazi art agents, their buying and selling of artworks was a crucial part of the story that previous scholars have overlooked. By bringing their stories to light based on research in the papers of the Art Looting Investigation Unit (ALIU), we gain a richer understanding of how Nazi expropriation efforts worked. In so doing, it also contributes to our understanding of the illegal movements of looted assets by those opportunistic art dealers, as well as the Allied attempts of investigating those involved and bringing them to justice.