The Vanished Collection
Stolen masterpieces, family secrets and one woman's quest for the truth
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
A charming and heartfelt story about war, art, and the lengths a woman will go to find the truth about her family.
'As devourable as a thriller... Incredibly moving' Elle
'Pauline Baer de Perignon is a natural storyteller – refreshingly honest, curious and open' Menachem Kaiser
'A terrific book' Le Point
It all started with a list of paintings. There, scribbled by a cousin she hadn't seen for years, were the names of the masters whose works once belonged to her great-grandfather, Jules Strauss: Renoir, Monet, Degas, Tiepolo and more. Pauline Baer de Perignon knew little to nothing about Strauss, or about his vanished, precious art collection.
But the list drove her on a frenzied trail of research in the archives of the Louvre and the Dresden museums, through Gestapo records, and to consult with Nobel laureate Patrick Modiano. What happened in 1942? And what became of the collection after Nazis seized her great-grandparents' elegant Parisian apartment?
The quest takes Pauline Baer de Perignon from the Occupation of France to the present day as she breaks the silence around the wrenching experiences her family never fully transmitted, and asks what art itself is capable of conveying over time.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Baer de Perignon recounts her remarkable quest to pursue her family's lost art collection in this riveting debut. When she learned from a cousin that paintings owned by her great-grandfather, a respected Jewish art collector, may have been stolen by Nazis during WWII (rather than sold in an auction, as she'd been told), Baer de Perignon went on a hunt to reclaim her family's contribution to French art history. Over the next several years, her quest took her from the archives of the Musée d'Orsay to the Louvre and the German Federal Archives, and leads from each—and unexpected information from Nobel laureate Patrick Modiano—brought Baer de Perignon closer to unearthing the truth. With the help of family members, museum curators, and art historians, Baer de Perignon eventually secured the return of Tiepolo's Shepherd from the Louvre and Largillière's Portrait of a Lady as Pomona from the Dresden museum after a complicated restitution process. More moving discoveries that come to the fore during her pursuit are those she realizes about herself: "In my brilliant family... I've often felt left behind... This was where I belonged." This page-turner will delight art history and mystery fans alike.
