Who could have guessed that a Hollywood-worthy tale of international intrigue was unfolding behind the scenes at a local art museum?
But that's exactly what was happening during the final weeks of a just-closed exhibit at The Mary Brogan Museum of Art & Science.
Federal officials have ordered the Brogan not to return one of 50 paintings on loan from a museum in Italy because it is believed to have been stolen by Nazis during World War II.
U.S. authorities are working with the Brogan and the Italian government to determine the owners of the painting, and what to do with it, said Chucha Barber, the Brogan's CEO.
The breathtaking 473-year-old painting, Christ Carrying the Cross Dragged by a Rogue, is by the Italian Renaissance artist Girolamo Romano. It was part of the 50-piece exhibit, Baroque Painting in Lombardy from Pinacoteca di Brera, which went up March 18 and was disassembled last weekend.
Barber, working with a curator from the Pinacoteca museum in Milan, intends to put the Romano painting back on display as the Brogan continues a crucial fundraising campaign. A little more than two months ago, the museum embarked on a five-month, $500,000 capital campaign needed to meet day-to-day expenses and payroll. The museum invested heavily to bring the Baroque exhibit to the Brogan.
"I see this as a teachable moment regarding the value of museums and museum objects," Barber told the Tallahassee Democrat in an exclusive interview. "It's also one family's incredible story about the atrocities of the Holocaust."
Barber first learned that the painting may have been stolen by Nazis when she was contacted by Pamela Marsh, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Florida, on July 21. Barber did not know how Marsh came to suspect the painting was tied to Nazi plunder.
It is believed that the Nazi-sympathetic French Vichy government seized and sold the work in question, when the Gentili family -- the Jewish family that owned the masterwork -- fled Nazi occupation during the war.
Barber has since received a phone call from Lionel Salem, a grandson of the painting's owner who lives in London. He thanked her for taking care of the painting.
Barber said she was told by Marsh's office that the painting cannot be returned to Italy until the ownership disputes are resolved.
Giuseppe Gentili's grandchildren have taken legal steps to find and reclaim works lost during the Nazi occupation. In 1999, an appeals court forced the Louvre to return five paintings to the Gentili family.
Attempts to reach Marsh were unsuccessful.
