A classical music foundation compensated the heirs of a woman who was forced to sell two music manuscripts to a German museum before she died in the Holocaust, the Associated Press reported Wednesday.
The Klassik Stiftung Weimar found relatives of Emma Frankenbacher, a German woman who died in the Theresienstadt concentration camp, living in Argentina, according to the Associated Press. The Klassik Stiftung Weimar, which “focuses on the era of Weimar Classicism and its effects on the art and culture of the 19th century,” collects documents related to the life and work of composer Franz Liszt, who wrote the manuscripts.
The compensation comes on Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is the anniversary of the Allied liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. (RELATED: Holocaust Survivors Return To Auschwitz On 75th Anniversary Of Liberation)
Each year on January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—we gather as a community to mark International #HolocaustRemembranceDay.
Join us tomorrow as we honor the memory of the victims and carry forward the messages of survivors. #WeRemember
— US Holocaust Museum (@HolocaustMuseum) January 26, 2021
Neither the foundation nor Frankenbacher’s heirs disclosed how much the Klassik Stiftung Weimar paid, according to the AP. Frankenbacher originally sold the manuscripts for the equivalent of $370 in 1937. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum considers transactions like these, where a Jewish owner “accepted a selling price that was only 20 or 30 percent of the actual value,” a forced sale.
The United States government estimates that roughly 20% of all art held in Europe was looted by the Nazis. Recovering the art and compensating Holocaust victims has required an international effort, with multiple commissions set up, according to the Jewish Virtual Library.