German provenance
The principal part of the investigation into the provenance history of the NK collection works centred around the question as to whether they were looted from the Netherlands during the German occupation or were sold unwillingly. However, the possibility that an art work was taken from Jewish owners in Germany must also be taken into consideration. As early as 1933, under the Nazi regime in Germany, Dutch art dealers and collectors were buying art from the forced auctions of Jewish property. This brought art works that had already been tainted to the Netherlands. Furthermore, during the German occupation, paintings owned by Germans - especially from Hermann Göring's collection - were sold to dealers based in the Netherlands or exchanged for other items owned by those dealers. These dealers then sold the works back to Germans. We can wonder whether works of art that were clearly exclusively traded on a voluntary basis between 1940 and 1945 had in fact previously changed hands as stolen property.
