The German Lost Art Foundation invites you to the next event within the series „Kolloquium Provenienzforschung“

On Monday, 30 June 2025, at 6 pm, Meike Hoffmann, Barani Shira Guttsmann and Alexander Boll will be presenting the research work of the reconstruction project “Persecuted and robbed. The Sultan family and their property seized by the National Socialists“ which is currently funded by the German Lost Art Foundation.

Research is undertaken by a team at Freie Universität Berlin led by Dr Meike Hoffmann. For the first time, the team works directly with a third generation descendant: Barani Shira Guttsmann, the heir representative of the Berlin entrepreneur Adolf Sultan. The Sultan family had many gifted members: among others, a successful entrepreneur, an eminent physician, a world-wide renowned pianist and a noted economist and social scientist. Many fled the country, were murdered or took their own life. While the research project focuses on the cultural property seized from the family’s last German home in Berlin-Nikolassee, the story of the individual Sultans is coming to the fore.

This particular collaboration between the university and a member of the third generation of descendants yields unexpected opportunities. The students, who are being trained in provenance research by Meike Hoffmann at FU, are actively involved in the project and have the unique chance of working face to face with a member of the family whose fate they are investigating. For the descendant, being closely integrated in the professional research and the training program is an opportunity to reveal a long-forgotten family history in detail, and to observe how the sometimes arduous process of tracing looted art eight decades after the fact is handled at a German academic institution and supported by government funding. Working this way changes the narrative and lays the groundwork for new collaborations. In historical research poring over archival records, all participants gain insights in the especially sensitive human aspects of this type of scholarly endeavour and contribute thus to shaping a common culture of remembrance.

The event will take place as a video conference via Webex. Participation is free of charge, but only possible after registration by 27 June 2025. Participants will receive their access data on the day of the event.

Registrations to:
German Lost Art Foundation
Heinrich Natho
Humboldtstr. 12 | 39112 Magdeburg
veranstaltungen@kulturgutverluste.de

With your registration and participation, you allow the organizer to record the event and to use it for public relations and documentation (§ 22 KunstUrhG). The organizer collects, processes and uses your personal data within the scope of performing the statutory task of the German Lost Art Foundation.