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PHOTOS OF SOME ARTWORKS DESCRIBED IN STORY PROVIDED BY THE FRED JONES JR. MUSEUM OF ART WEBSITE
OU museum houses forty pieces with Nazi connections from WWII A
fter OU was sued for housing a piece of art that was looted by Nazis during World War II, The Daily discovered that the university’s museum currently has 40 pieces of art with Nazi connections. PAIGHTEN HARKINS DIGITAL MANAGING EDITOR @PAIGHTEN HARKINS The Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art currently has 40 pieces of art with Nazi provenance, according to the Nazi-Era Provenance Internet Portal and confirmed in a statement from OU officials in an email from OU press secretary Corbin Wallace. The Nazi-Era Provenance Internet Portal is a searchable database of items in U.S. museums that could have ties to Nazi Germany during the times when Nazis were looting art from occupied countries. The Nazi era is typically considered between 1933 and 1945, when World War II ended. To be added to the registry, a piece must have been created before 1946 and acquired by the museum after 1932, changed owners between 1932 and 1946 and it must have been in continental Europe during those years, according to the database’s website. The database stores information from 175 self-reporting museums. The database is a registry of 29,031 individual items with Nazi provenance. The piece involved in the lawsuit is a painting by French impressionist Camille Pissarro, “Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep (La bergère rentrant des moutons).” Leone Meyer filed suit against OU in May 2013 to reclaim the painting, which was stolen from her family by Nazis occupation forces and the Vichy Regime in Nazi-occupied France sometime
LEGISLATION
between 1940 and 1944. “Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep” was donated to the Fred Jones museum by Aaron and Clara Weitzenhoffer in 2000. Aaron and Clara Weirzenhoffer are the parents of OU Regent Max Weitzenhoffer. The Weitzenhoffer College of Fine Arts is named after the family, which has been a longtime university donor. Some of the items with Nazi provenance in the museum include “Portrait of Alexander Reid” by Vincent van Gogh, “Riverbank at Lavacourt (La Berge à Lavacourt)” by Claude Monet and three other pieces by Pissarro: “Nude with Swans,” a lithograph of “Nude with Swans” and “The Meadow at Eragny (Le Pré à Eragny),” according to the database. All of those pieces were donated by the Weitzenhoffers. The statement said many pieces in the museum’s collections are gifts to the museum, and all pieces reported on the database were gifts.
Nazi-era provenance and museums
provenance in American museums, Blanton said. During the economic boom, many wealthy Americans began collecting art, which was now available in large quantities after the war. OU’s statements echoed Blanton’s, but it added that before the mid-’70s record keeping was inconsistent for the pieces that flowed into the U.S. after World War II, meaning many of the wealthy Americans who bought these suspect artworks were unclear of the art’s origins. In many cases, like in the case with “Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep,” the piece’s new owners died and the works were donated to museums like Fred Jones Jr., Blanton said. The portal was created for just that reason, Blanton said. The portal serves a two-fold purpose: to help museums that may have art with Nazi-era provenance and to help heirs find pieces looted from their families. “It’s not easy work. As you can imagine, there’s a lot of investigative work that goes into this,” Blanton said. When asked how OU specifically deals with art after finding it has Nazi-era provenance, the statement said the museum uses donor-completed and provided provenance research. If museum officials find it necessary, they will conduct additional provenance research. The statement said that museum officials are unaware of any pieces of art “that have established ownership other than in the university or the OU Foundation.”
Because of the breadth of art looting during the Nazi era, it is fairly common for museums to have some pieces of art in their collections with some Nazi provenance, said Dewey Meyer’s suit against the university prompted criticism Blanton, American Alliance of Museums strategic commufrom community members and lawmaker Mike Reynolds, nications director. who warned of future lawsuits regarding the different pieces The looting, which confused the provenance of many of Nazi-era provenance art housed at Fred Jones Jr. pieces of art by switching hands so many times, and the economic boom for the U.S. following World War II are two SEE ART PAGE 2 factors that contribute to the prevalence of art with Nazi-era
Meyer’s lawsuit
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STUDENT GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION
Affirmative consent policy considered Newly elected SGA Student congress to gauge student interest in changing sexual misconduct policy DANA BRANHAM News Reporter @danabranham
OU’s Undergraduate Student congress will gauge student interest in adopting an affirmative consent policy after California lawmakers recently passed similar legislation. Earlier this year, California passed a statewide law requiring all its colleges and universities to adopt affirmative consent policies: policies that require “affirmative, conscious and voluntary” agreement from all parties before engaging in sexual activity, according to the bill’s text. Affirmative consent policies are often referred to as “yes-means-yes” policies, while policies like OU’s are “nomeans-no” policies. As OU’s sexual misconduct, discrimination and harassment policy defines consent, “‘no’ must always mean ‘no,’ and the absence of ‘no’ does not mean yes.” With reported cases of sexual assault on the rise over the last few years —both at OU and nationwide — Daniel Pae, Undergraduate Student Congress academic affairs chairperson, said OU should consider adopting an affirmative consent policy. WEATHER Sunny today with a high of 63, low of 41. Follow @AndrewGortonWX on Twitter for weather updates.
A university should be safe and encouraging environment for all students, and they shouldn’t feel threatened or be threatened by anyone.” DANIEL PAE, UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT CONGRESS ACADEMIC AFFAIRS CHAIRPERSON
Pae said he would like to survey the student body to gauge support for that kind of policy change and, depending on the results, work with OU administration to see if they’re open to a policy change. Because the policy could broadly impact OU, Pae, a political science and economics sophomore, said he wants to see what issues students might disagree on in relation to an affirmative consent policy. “We’d mostly want to know: do you support a change from ‘no-means-no’ to ‘yes-means-yes’ in the university policy, and I think that’d be the main question,” Pae said. SEE CONSENT PAGE 2
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officers announced Kunal Naik to become SGA president and Alex Byron to be vice president PAGE JONES News Reporter @pageousm
Kunal Naik and Alex Byron have been elected as the president and vice president of Student Government Association after running uncontested. During his first days in office, Naik said he wants to focus on learning about what his predecessor, Matt Epting, did for OU, making sure those policies and programs are sustainable and combining them with his own innovative policies. “I’m really proud of the work that me and Alex and our team did and I’m really excited to get started,” Naik said. About 5.3 percent of the student population voted in this year’s presidential elections, an improvement from last spring’s uncontested election’s 2 percent voter turn out, said Taylor Petersen, election board chairperson. Petersen said he is happy with the turnout because of the improvement and because uncontested races generally don’t have high numbers. SEE SGA PAGE 2
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