II In 1934 Modern Paintings, Inc. was dissolved, its assets being absorbed by Jacques Seligmann & Co. and Tessa Corporation, another subsidiary of the company. In 1935 another subsidiary was founded: the Contemporary American Department, which was formed to represent emerging American artists, led by gallery employee Theresa D. Parker. In Paris, the city offered to purchase Palais de Sagan in connection with plans for the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne in 1937. Jacques Seligmann & Co. focused its Paris business at the Rue de la Paix location, and New York became the international headquarters. Germain's half-brother, Francois-Gérard, ran the Paris office, and Germain continued to travel back and forth across the Atlantic until he made New York his permanent residence in 1939. Germain served on the Exhibition Committee for the 1939 New York World's Fair, coordinating the art area and the French art section. In June 1940 as the Germans occupied Paris the company's sales plummeted and that summer the Seligmann galleries and family holdings were seized by the Vichy government, including Germain's private art collection. The majority of the Paris firm's stock and the family house and contents were sold at private auction. The family burned their Paris archives in order to prevent their acquisition by the Nazis. The New York office moved from 51st St. to a smaller space at 5 E. 57th St. Arnold Seligmann & Co. was left without a director, and Germain consolidated the two family businesses after a reconciliation between quarreling family members. The financial and administrative interests of the Paris and New York offices were separated, and remained linked only by association. Later years After the war, Jacques Seligmann & Co. focused heavily on the recovery of looted art and property, as well as on the organization of business matters. In 1951 Germain sold the House of Arenberg's family collection of illuminated manuscripts, engravings and paintings, including Portrait of a Young Woman by Johannes Vermeer which sold for over a quarter million dollars. In 1953 they sold works from the collection of Franz Joseph II, Prince of Liechtenstein, and purchased seven Italian marble sculptures which were sold to the Kress Foundation in 1954. The firm continued to exhibit works by contemporary artists, only to turn the focus back towards traditional art and drawings, struggling to regain the leading edge they once held in the art market. The