The return
Many of the art objects which were taken from the Netherlands to Germany during the war were never recovered. Most of the artworks that were recovered, had been hidden in mines and remote castles. The largest storage site was the Alt Aussee salt mine near Bad Ischl, where approximately 15,000 paintings had been stored. On 11 June 1945, the Netherlands Art Property Foundation (SNK - Stichting Nederlands Kunstbezit) was established.
The SNK was responsible for the recovery of art from Germany as well as for returning it to the owners from whom it had been stolen. The SNK was also to be provisional custodian of the works of art that the Allies had agreed were the rightful property of the Dutch State. On 26 October 1945, the first load of art - a plane full of paintings - arrived at Schiphol Airport. There was a celebration to mark the arrival of this first shipment, which was the beginning of the large-scale restitution of stolen artworks to the Netherlands. A few thousand paintings, hundreds of carpets, thousands of pieces of furniture and applied art were recovered.
The SNK was only able to return some of these to the rightful owners on behalf of the Dutch State. This was partially a result of the sheer amount of information that had to be worked through, but was also related to the strict bureaucratic and financial conditions that had been set for the restitution. Nor was the SNK's restitution policy always consistent.
In 1950 the SNK organised a few exhibitions of recovered artwork. The display was made up of some 2,400 paintings, 1,000 drawings and 600 carpets, as well as furniture, household effects, pottery and sculptures. The exhibitions were intended for the people who had reported their possessions stolen. This gave them the opportunity to identify the property that had been stolen from them. Not all the resulting claims were honoured. Of the remaining artworks in the custody of the SNK, more than 4.000 were passed on to the State and loaned to various museums or representative government buildings. The rest were auctioned. After 1952, only an occasional claim was lodged for the remaining artworks.
