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Unravelling the mysteries behind the Gurlitt art collection

A painting
Keystone

A podcast about a controversial art collection

A collection left to the Museum of Fine Arts in Bern by the son of a Nazi art collector is now on show in the Swiss capital. At first, little was known about the ownership history of these pieces, but painstaking work has been carried out to discover where the artwork came from, before it was confiscated by the Nazi party under Hitler for being “degenerate art”. 

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A British multimedia journalist who moved to Switzerland in 2010, Jo has worked in TV, radio and online. She leads a team of video journalists, picture editors, a graphic designer, data journalist and community developer, and specialises in social media. Initials: jf

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Gurlitt art collection ‘opportunity for Switzerland’

This content was published on In an interview with the NZZ am Sonntag newspaper, museum vice-president Marcel Brülhart calls on the Federal Office of Culture to set up an independent centre for checking the provenance – or history of ownership – of art suspected of being looted by the Nazis. Instead, the ministry opposed the museum taking over the art collection…

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Inside the Gurlitt collection

This content was published on The collection includes paintings, sketches and prints, all handed down to Gurlitt from his art dealer father. It is valued at an estimated CHF1.23 billion ($1.4 billion). More than 200 of the paintings of inestimable value were the object of international search warrants issued long ago. (Pictures: AFP/Staatsanwaltschaft Augsburg)

Read more: Inside the Gurlitt collection

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SWI swissinfo.ch - a branch of Swiss Broadcasting Corporation SRG SSR