It is well documented that during the course of World War II, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler oversaw the plunder of countless works of art throughout Europe. The purpose of this paper is to explore the rationale behind the systematic art theft, understand the international politics and policy of restitution, and consider its geopolitical significance. The relationship between art and the various methods in which it intersects with international politics has been a guiding theme. As we quickly approach a more interconnected world, it has become increasingly necessary to explore how past injustices may continue to influence current diplomatic efforts. Through the analysis of various case studies identifying points of contention between nations, unhealed resentment over WWII-era injustices were identified and explored in greater depth. Although countries have made progress towards mediation and restitution, there is still much to be done in order to repair international relationships. Moving forward, it is essential to advance these efforts towards a mutually agreeable resolution.

Pour respecter les droits d'auteur, la version électronique de ce mémoire a été dépouillée de ses documents visuels et audiovisuels. La version intégrale du mémoire a été déposée au Service de la gestion des documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal. / Ce mémoire, consacré à la mise en exposition des œuvres d’art spoliées par les nazis, est particulièrement dédié à la vague d’expositions actuelles opérant de 2005 à 2010. À travers cet événement muséal unique de l’ordre d’une exposition temporaire par an en moyenne, prédomine un regain d’intérêt envers les événements liés à Seconde Guerre mondiale. Partant de ce constat singulier, nous avons retracé les grands enjeux actuels de ces expositions. Ce mémoire présente une rétrospective de ces dernières de 1946 à 2010. L’exposition d’œuvres spoliées en France fit l’objet d’une recherche inédite de la part de l’influente historienne de l’art Reesa Greenberg en une périodisation muséographique d’où sont issus trois cycles s’étendant de 1933 à la publication de son article en 2004. L’association d’une seconde périodisation à celle de Reesa Greenberg, de l’ordre de l’événementiel, fut ajoutée à l’analyse, celle-ci concernant deux cycles de politique publique de restitution en France de l’historienne Claire Andrieu. La combinaison de ces deux sources témoigne de deux phases importantes de restitution et de mise en exposition, soit une première après 1945 et une seconde à la fin des années 1990, mettant en lumière de nombreuses associations entre la spoliation des œuvres et l’Holocauste, les diverses persécutions faites aux Juifs et l’évolution de notre regard sur ces événements. La poursuite de cette réflexion fut rendue possible grâce à l’étude de cas consacrée à la mise en exposition d’une partie des œuvres restituées en 2006 par le gouvernement de Hollande à la belle-fille du collectionneur juif Jacques Goudstikker, dont la galerie fut spoliée en 1940 à Amsterdam par Hermann Göring. De ce fait, une visite de l’exposition au Jewish Museum de New York en 2009 fut incluse à l’analyse globale des expositions européennes actuelles. Au sein de cette nouvelle phase de mise en exposition, alors que la restitution des œuvres est régulièrement contestée, la relation entre la mémoire des disparus devenus les fantômes de l’Holocauste et leurs biens est omniprésente. Ainsi les expositions, en ce début du XXIe siècle, nous permettent plus que jamais d’affirmer que les événements liés au pillage artistique font encore partie d’un récit toujours inachevé. / This thesis, dedicated to the display of looted art by Nazis after World War II, is particularly dedicated to the wave of current exhibitions operating from 2005 till 2010. Throughout this unique museum event, which consists of one temporary exhibition per year on average, a renewed interest for the events pertaining to World War II prevails. Considering this singular statement, we examined the major current stakes in these exhibitions. This thesis presents a retrospective of these exhibitions from 1946 till 2010. Looted art exhibitions in France have been the object of important research by the influential art historian Reesa Greenberg and were presented in a museographic periodisation from which arise three phases contained between 1933 and 2004, the year of her article’s publication. The addition of two cycles based on French public restitution policy by the historian Claire Andrieu, besides the one proposed by Reesa Greenberg, was included in our analysis. In embodying these two sources, we have testified to two important phases of restitution dealing with exhibition, beginning after 1945 for the first one and at the end of the 1990s for the second one, bringing to light numerous associations between the artistic plunder and the Holocaust, the manifold persecutions against Jews and the evolution of our perception on these events. The pursuit of this reflection was made possible thanks to the case study dedicated to the exhibition of the art collection that was partly returned in 2006 by the Netherlands’government to the daughter-in-law of the Jewish collector Jacques Goudstikker, whose gallery was looted in 1940 in Amsterdam by Hermann Göring. Therefore, a visit of the exhibition at the Jewish Museum in New York in 2009 was included in the global analysis in order to facilitate our understanding of the current exhibitions. Within this new phase of exhibition, where the reclaiming of the looted paintings is regularly disputed, the relation between memory, the dead and the missing persons who have become the ghosts of the Holocaust and their stolen properties is omnipresent. Thus the exhibitions, at this beginning of the XXI century, allow us more than ever to assert that the events bound to the artistic plunder are still a part of a yet unfinished chapter.

Ce mémoire, consacré à la mise en exposition des œuvres d’art spoliées par les nazis, est particulièrement dédié à la vague d’expositions actuelles opérant de 2005 à 2010. À travers cet événement muséal unique de l’ordre d’une exposition temporaire par an en moyenne, prédomine un regain d’intérêt envers les événements liés à Seconde Guerre mondiale. Partant de ce constat singulier, nous avons retracé les grands enjeux actuels de ces expositions. Ce mémoire présente une rétrospective de ces dernières de 1946 à 2010. L’exposition d’œuvres spoliées en France fit l’objet d’une recherche inédite de la part de l’influente historienne de l’art Reesa Greenberg en une périodisation muséographique d’où sont issus trois cycles s’étendant de 1933 à la publication de son article en 2004. L’association d’une seconde périodisation à celle de Reesa Greenberg, de l’ordre de l’événementiel, fut ajoutée à l’analyse, celle-ci concernant deux cycles de politique publique de restitution en France de l’historienne Claire Andrieu. La combinaison de ces deux sources témoigne de deux phases importantes de restitution et de mise en exposition, soit une première après 1945 et une seconde à la fin des années 1990, mettant en lumière de nombreuses associations entre la spoliation des œuvres et l’Holocauste, les diverses persécutions faites aux Juifs et l’évolution de notre regard sur ces événements. La poursuite de cette réflexion fut rendue possible grâce à l’étude de cas consacrée à la mise en exposition d’une partie des œuvres restituées en 2006 par le gouvernement de Hollande à la belle-fille du collectionneur juif Jacques Goudstikker, dont la galerie fut spoliée en 1940 à Amsterdam par Hermann Göring. De ce fait, une visite de l’exposition au Jewish Museum de New York en 2009 fut incluse à l’analyse globale des expositions européennes actuelles. Au sein de cette nouvelle phase de mise en exposition, alors que la restitution des œuvres est régulièrement contestée, la relation entre la mémoire des disparus devenus les fantômes de l’Holocauste et leurs biens est omniprésente. Ainsi les expositions, en ce début du XXIe siècle, nous permettent plus que jamais d’affirmer que les événements liés au pillage artistique font encore partie d’un récit toujours inachevé. / This thesis, dedicated to the display of looted art by Nazis after World War II, is particularly dedicated to the wave of current exhibitions operating from 2005 till 2010. Throughout this unique museum event, which consists of one temporary exhibition per year on average, a renewed interest for the events pertaining to World War II prevails. Considering this singular statement, we examined the major current stakes in these exhibitions. This thesis presents a retrospective of these exhibitions from 1946 till 2010. Looted art exhibitions in France have been the object of important research by the influential art historian Reesa Greenberg and were presented in a museographic periodisation from which arise three phases contained between 1933 and 2004, the year of her article’s publication. The addition of two cycles based on French public restitution policy by the historian Claire Andrieu, besides the one proposed by Reesa Greenberg, was included in our analysis. In embodying these two sources, we have testified to two important phases of restitution dealing with exhibition, beginning after 1945 for the first one and at the end of the 1990s for the second one, bringing to light numerous associations between the artistic plunder and the Holocaust, the manifold persecutions against Jews and the evolution of our perception on these events. The pursuit of this reflection was made possible thanks to the case study dedicated to the exhibition of the art collection that was partly returned in 2006 by the Netherlands’government to the daughter-in-law of the Jewish collector Jacques Goudstikker, whose gallery was looted in 1940 in Amsterdam by Hermann Göring. Therefore, a visit of the exhibition at the Jewish Museum in New York in 2009 was included in the global analysis in order to facilitate our understanding of the current exhibitions. Within this new phase of exhibition, where the reclaiming of the looted paintings is regularly disputed, the relation between memory, the dead and the missing persons who have become the ghosts of the Holocaust and their stolen properties is omnipresent. Thus the exhibitions, at this beginning of the XXI century, allow us more than ever to assert that the events bound to the artistic plunder are still a part of a yet unfinished chapter. / Pour respecter les droits d'auteur, la version électronique de ce mémoire a été dépouillée de ses documents visuels et audiovisuels. La version intégrale du mémoire a été déposée au Service de la gestion des documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Past, Present, Future is an immersive and interactive art installation that seeks to put displaced Congolese and African artwork - commonly displayed in world museums - into their original cultural context. The exhibit's immersive experience sheds light on the colonial exploitation of African peoples and their lifestyles: specifically the expropriation of lived African spiritual and artistic expressions. These artifacts - sometimes stolen outright, sometimes obtained through imbalanced terms of trade, and sometimes obtained by fair bargain - often appear in exhibits as disembodied objects devoid of explanation or reinterpreted through the conceptions of the exploiters. This phenomenon has historically supported the consciousness of colonialism and now of post- and neo-colonialism, maintaining its propagation through museums, schools, and other institutions worldwide. The exhibition is composed of a virtual environment in addition to projection mapping. The visual, aural, and interactive elements engage with and challenge the viewer's culturally conditioned ways of thought regarding artwork "consumption." This thesis, building on the exhibition, examines the possibilities of employing evolving technology and coding toward the long-term task of "softly" repatriating displaced artifacts while starting a conversation about physical repatriation and providing a model that Congolese scholars and artists can use to preserve and reclaim their cultural heritage. / Master of Fine Arts / Pieces of art from Congo and much of Africa are often perceived in the Western world as exotic objects to be looked at and photographed. To the Congolese people, those objects are an essential part of their ongoing life. It goes without saying that they are central to the collective spirit, sense of the world, cultural identity, and ancestral history. Past, Present, Future is an immersive art installation that takes displaced works from Congo and other settings in Africa and restores their living context through a Congolese artist's lens. This paper examines the process by which they were extracted from their home and found their way onto Western institutions, what they were and what was lost, and how through contemporary technology-integrated creative expression, they may be made whole for the enrichment of those from whom they came, their current hosts, and people everywhere.

Iraq is a country of great cultural significance as it is where civilization first began. As a result of its lengthy occupation, it is virtually one large archaeological site. In spite of numerous warnings to the governments of both the United States and the United Kingdom, no efforts were made to protect the Iraqi National Museum in Baghdad when the American-led coalition unlawfully invaded Iraq. Indeed, orders were given not to interfere with the looting. During the occupation that followed, the United States failed to take steps to protect Iraqi cultural property. In terms of international law, it was obliged to protect Iraq’s cultural property. The United States also chose to exacerbate its unlawful conduct by occupying archaeological sites and damaging them further by illegal construction. As a result many significant sites have been irreparably damaged or destroyed. Their conduct was the result of complete indifference to the Iraqi cultural heritage. Although their actions render them iin breach of international law, it is unlikely that the United States will ever be prosecuted for its actions. / Old Testament & Ancient Near Eastern Studies / M.A. (Ancient Near Eastern Studies)

Iraq is a country of great cultural significance as it is where civilization first began. As a result of its lengthy occupation, it is virtually one large archaeological site. In spite of numerous warnings to the governments of both the United States and the United Kingdom, no efforts were made to protect the Iraqi National Museum in Baghdad when the American-led coalition unlawfully invaded Iraq. Indeed, orders were given not to interfere with the looting. During the occupation that followed, the United States failed to take steps to protect Iraqi cultural property. In terms of international law, it was obliged to protect Iraq’s cultural property. The United States also chose to exacerbate its unlawful conduct by occupying archaeological sites and damaging them further by illegal construction. As a result many significant sites have been irreparably damaged or destroyed. Their conduct was the result of complete indifference to the Iraqi cultural heritage. Although their actions render them iin breach of international law, it is unlikely that the United States will ever be prosecuted for its actions. / Biblical and Ancient Studies / M.A. (Ancient Near Eastern Studies)