Provenance research on the Expressionist prints in the Dr. Hans Lühdorf collection

In the period from 1949 to 1968, Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf—today the Kunstpalast Museum—received a prestigious collection of around 120 works of Expressionist art on paper from the Düsseldorf lawyer Dr. Hans Lühdorf (1910–1983). 70 of these works were a donation in 1964. Prompted by its desire to exhibit the collection, the Kunstpalast Museum made a commitment to identify the provenance of the works created prior to 1945, only a few of which were known about at the beginning of the project. Incidental remarks on the origin of the works by the artists concerned or details in works catalogs, in which individual sheets are listed, provided information in some cases. It was still necessary, however, to investigate how and when most of the works had entered the Lühdorf collection.
In the course of the research, it was revealed that Dr. Hans Lühdorf began methodically building up his collection at the start of 1939 in consultation with the Kunstmuseum. In his many visits to the Degenerate Art exhibition, held 14 times in Düsseldorf alone, he became increasingly interested in Expressionism and decided to save these works by the formerly ostracized artists for posterity.
Around a third of the artworks examined—among which works by Schmidt-Rottluff, Heckel, Jawlensky, Nolde, Mueller and Klee are most frequently represented—were acquired by the collector at Galerie Vömel in Düsseldorf, which also put him in contact with a large group of artists and collectors. 11 of the sheets acquired from Vömel were able to be identified; in some cases traces of these went back even further. Three sheets from the Vömel stock (five of the bundle examined in total) feature a numbering system that was identified during the project as relating to the storage system of Galerie Arnold (proprietor: Ludwig Wilhelm Gutbier), who was based in Dresden in 1818–1934 and in Munich from 1937. It is a five-digit number written in pencil on the bottom right of the front side, preceded by an R.
The provenance of around 10% of the works was able to be clarified in full, namely always when the collector had obtained the prints from the artists themselves. Lühdorf increasingly made contact with the artists directly as opportunities to purchase works from art dealers became much more limited. For example, Jawlensky gave him several lithographs; the collector had visited him around 30 times in Wiesbaden in the final months of his life. Lühdorf also acquired a woodcut by Franz Marc from him. Emil Nolde left some of his own etchings to Lühdorf for his commitment to the sick Jawlensky. As the overwhelming majority of the collection consists of graphic prints, no clear overlaps were identified with the works listed in the Degenerate Art database which were confiscated from German museums in 1937/38.
Two sheets are suspicious as they were previously owned by Alfred Hess, whose heirs were consulted for clarification. These works need to be scrutinized more closely.

(c) Museum Kunstpalast Düsseldorf